The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right
Author
Atul Gawande
Publication Date
December 2009
Publisher
Metropolitan Books
FROM AMAZON.COM: The New York Times bestselling author of Better and Complications reveals the surprising power of the ordinary checklist

We live in a world of great and increasing complexity, where even the most expert professionals struggle to master the tasks they face. Longer training, ever more advanced technologies—neither seems to prevent grievous errors. But in a hopeful turn, acclaimed surgeon and writer Atul Gawande finds a remedy in the humblest and simplest of techniques: the checklist.

First introduced decades ago by the U.S. Air Force, checklists have enabled pilots to fly aircraft of mind-boggling sophistication. Now innovative checklists are being adopted in hospitals around the world, helping doctors and nurses respond to everything from flu epidemics to avalanches. Even in the immensely complex world of surgery, a simple ninety-second variant has cut the rate of fatalities by more than a third.

In riveting stories, Gawande takes us from Austria, where an emergency checklist saved a drowning victim who had spent half an hour underwater, to Michigan, where a cleanliness checklist in intensive care units virtually eliminated a type of deadly hospital infection. He explains how checklists actually work to prompt striking and immediate improvements. And he follows the checklist revolution into fields well beyond medicine, from disaster response to investment banking, skyscraper construction, and businesses of all kinds.

An intellectual adventure in which lives are lost and saved and one simple idea makes a tremendous difference, The Checklist Manifesto is essential reading for anyone working to get things right.

Atul Gawande is the author of Better and Complications. He is also a MacArthur Fellow, a general surgeon at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, a staff writer for The New Yorker, and an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health. He lives with his wife and three children in Newton, Massachusetts.

Taxed with great and increasing complexity, even the most expert professionals struggle to master the tasks they face. Longer training, ever more advanced technologies—neither seems to prevent grievous errors. But in a hopeful turn, acclaimed surgeon and writer Atul Gawande finds a remedy to this disquieting problem in the humblest and simplest of techniques: the checklist.

First introduced decades ago by the U.S. Air Force, checklists have enabled pilots to fly aircraft of mind-boggling sophistication. Now innovative checklists are being adopted in hospitals around the world, helping doctors and nurses respond to everything from flu epidemics to avalanches. Even in the immensely complex world of surgery, a simple ninety-second variant has cut the rate of fatalities by more than a third.

Gawande provides real testimonials in the form of riveting stories. In Austria, an emergency checklist saved a drowning victim who had spent half an hour underwater. In Michigan, a cleanliness checklist in intensive care units virtually eliminated a type of deadly hospital infection. He explains how checklists actually work to prompt striking and immediate improvements to procedure and increase positive results, even under the most precarious circumstances. And he follows the checklist revolution into fields well beyond medicine, from disaster response to investment banking, skyscraper construction, and businesses of all kinds.

Gawande shows how one simple idea can make a tremendous difference. The Checklist Manifesto is essential reading for anyone working to get things right.

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Two Comments
Kevin Milden on September 8, 2010 9:36pm
I didn't like the book. Although the author gets the idea of the importance of checklists and I have implemented that within my business. He continually goes back to a number of horrific medical procedures. I have a very visual imagination so I gaged many times reading the book and eventually had to put it down as it was just too gruesome to continue reading.
Stephanie Aaron on October 10, 2010 10:50pm
This book is excellent. It shows how a simple thing like a list can make a huge difference. The most important thing I learned is that most mistakes aren't made by incompetent people but by highly competent people not being careful.
The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right
By Atul Gawande
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  1. The Problem of Extreme Complexity
  2. The Checklist
  3. The End of the Master Builder
  4. The Idea
  5. The First Try
  6. The Checklist Factory
  7. The Test
  8. The Hero in the Age of Checklists
  9. The Save