The Checklist Manifesto: A Guide to Achieving Maximum Efficiency and Effectiveness

Mitesh Lashkari: You could synthesize the learnings from this book in less than three pages, rest all are examples from author’s own experiences. But then the power of any concept is in its successful application in the real world.

A good book to get exposure to the world of checklists.

India on Aug 30, 2023

Jenkintown family: Skip to the checklists at the end and then read the book for fun. Checklists save lives and save time and aggravation.

United States on Aug 10, 2023

MR S GREGORY: Well written book THAT WILL convert you to a checklist zealot! If you work in ANY process driven environment then this book is essential reading.

United Kingdom on Aug 01, 2023

adam fimbres: My goodness, this book is a combination of good writing, harrowing anecdotes, and a burden of evidence so large, I can believe I only just learned about the silent keeper of millions of live; the checklist. A truly powerful read. It was short yet impactful, and I'll definitely be recommending this book.

United States on Jul 15, 2023

LollieK: Many people make lists - grocery lists, favorite songs, even a Bucket List. But a simple concept - the checklist - always seems to be an afterthought, or just a general idea (things to do today, etc). Dr. Gawande shows how checklists can save lives, keep buildings up, and can even apply to investment portfolios. I’m not a doctor, engineer, pilot, or stockbroker, yet even I see the benefits now. The use of a good checklist can help with ANY endeavor: fundraising, volunteer projects, customer service, problem solving - the list (no pun intended) goes on. This is a great read and will get you thinking about a little mundane thing called The Checklist.

United States on Jul 13, 2023

H. SebastianH. Sebastian: I found this book referenced to in some other like, for example, within the great„thinking – fast & slow“ by Mr. Kahnemann. After adding it to my personal must read list for later use, I stumbled across some structural challenges within my business life, where I decided to give it a shot.
Mr. Gawande, being a successful surgeon by himself, applied the tried and tested method of using checklists for extreme complex problems to the field of medicine. This was done due a request of the UN in order to reduce the amount of deaths related to (incomplete) operating procedures resp. their preparations.
While the topic itself sounds quite dry, I was very positively surprised how quick and easy to read this book was, this is linked to the many anecdotes and experiences Mr. Gawande uses to transfer his journey to the application of checklists. The chapters within this book have the right length for an evening read, language is exact without being to boring, the book is closed by a detailed appendix. While the topic is probably not a read for everybody, I can recommend it for persons looking for a guidance to introduce this tool to structure complex challenges.

Germany on Sep 26, 2022

Karl Melrose: I’ve had the checklist manifesto in my “to-read” list for about 5 years now. It’s a book I’ve had reccomended to me many times and, in a nutshell, it’s a manifesto for the use of checklists. Atul Gawande who wrote it is a surgeon who has a history of process improvement projects. The checklist manifesto is his attempt to convince people that checklists, simple as they are, can massively improve the output quality and consistency of tasks that we repeat frequently. What is more surprising though, is that his research uncovers that even in areas where there are complex problems for which we can’t cheklist – checklists can help significantly in resolving complex and unforeseen problems.
The thesis is simple. Checklists raise output quality and consistency. The reason they do this is simple – we overestimate our ability to routinely perform series of tasks dramatically. In scenarios where there is stress or complication, the rate at which we overestimate our ability rises dramatically. Gawande examines three key scenarios – flight checklists, large scale construction projects and his own home – the operating theater.
IN each scenario, he tackles simple,...

Australia on Oct 26, 2018

Ian Mann: The author, Dr Atul Gawande is an American general and endocrine surgeon, and public health researcher. I have been meaning to read and review his book for many years. What a fitting introduction to ‘The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right.’
Philosophers Samuel Gorovitz and Alasdair MacIntyre tackled the issue of why we fail at what we set out to do in the world. One reason, they explain is “necessary fallibility”, a consequence of some things in the world, and our lives, being beyond our understanding and control.
But there is much that is not, and yet we fail at these too. Gorovitz and MacIntyre suggest that there are two reasons for this: ignorance and ineptitude (incompetence or clumsiness.)
For most of human history, people’s lives have been lived largely in ignorance. However, over the last few decades, science has filled in enough knowledge to make our ‘ineptitude’ as much of a challenge as our ‘ignorance’ was in the past.
Gawande’s context is the ineptitude in medicine. While our knowledge and sophistication has grown enormously, the struggle is still how to deliver on this know-how.
The knowing-doing gap is found everywhere....

United States on Jun 19, 2017

John M. Ford: Atul Gawande is a physician interested in improving surgical practice. He reviews surgical cases with disastrous outcomes that could have been prevented and cites research claiming that nearly half of deaths that occur in surgery are in fact preventable. We read a detailed analysis of a drowning accident in which the young victim's life was saved against all odds. Why? Because the hospital staff had discussed and practiced the procedures to treat cold-water drowning ahead of time. They used no new knowledge; they just coordinated and communicated more effectively.

Gawande examines how human beings do things. There are two reasons we fail at complex tasks. The first is ignorance. We correct it by conducting research and building schools to increase our knowledge. The second and more common reason for failure is ineptitude--the right knowledge is available, but we do not apply it correctly. People continually forget, are distracted, or skip steps because they seem unimportant. This problem lurks below the radar; we don't recognize it, let alone try to solve it. Instead we send people off for more training to increase their knowledge.

What is needed instead is a simple...

United States on Feb 08, 2013

Olly Buxton: I'm squeamish. I don't dig unnecessarily detailed descriptions of surgery. So this - a business book written by a surgeon - was always going to be a tough one. It analogises best practice from surgical procedure to business, legal and engineering process and so has some - necessarily, I suppose - detailed descriptions of the grisly misdeeds that can happen when you carelessly cut people open. Ick.

A couple of anecdotes in the introduction were almost enough to put me off the book, but I boxed on. Pathetic, aren't I.

Happily, Atul Gawande soon moves out of the Intensive Care Unit and rarely returns. In the mean time he makes some surprising and valuable observations. I was going to say they are "counter-intuitive" but, in a strange way, they do seem intuitively right. So "surprising".

What is most surprising is that there is no paradigm-shifting reveal here: no "long tail", "tipping point", "black swan", "universal acid", or "wealthy network" which has fundamentally altered the rules of engagement in the collective enterprises we're talking about. The groundbreaking technique to which Gawande appeals for his insight is the humble checklist: not exactly Web 2.0,...

United Kingdom on Jun 06, 2011