There are three reasons why we err: necessary fallibility (we’re not omniscient and some things are outside of our human capacity; therefore, we err), ignorance (we may not know what to do; therefore, we err), and ineptitude (we know what to do but we don’t do it; therefore we err).

Atul Gawande’s The Checklist Manifesto is a powerful read. Atul is a world-class surgeon and public health researcher. In his book, he walks us through the astonishing power of astonishingly simple checklists. Teresa Amabile, a researcher at Harvard and author of Progress Principle states that she measured Gawande’s research in a three-month experiment. In this three-month experiment in eight different hospitals around the world, the rate of serious complications for surgical patients fell by 36 percent after introduction of the checklist, and deaths fell by 47 percent. Even Gawande himself, a highly trained surgeon with years of operating experience, found that his own performance improved notably after he started using the checklist. His point is that surgery, like any complex task, requires a regular check of all the fundamentals—to liberate the team to focus on the work and any unexpected circumstances that may arise.”

That surgical checklist was crazy simple. So simple that many surgeons (who have trained for decades to do what they do) thought it was laughably useless. It included very basic things like each member of the surgical team introducing themselves and confirming which side of the body the surgery would be performed on.

But the results from that super simple checklist were astonishing. Mortality fell by 47%.

FORTY-SEVEN PERCENT!!!

SO…how does this apply to you and I. First of all a checklist should be extremely simple. I have my “Daily Five,”(1.Read, 2. Write, 3. Reflective Thinking, 4. Who Can I impact Today, and 5. Exercise). Next, once you develop your list practice it everyday. YES, you heard me correctly – EVERYDAY! This is not a someday-maybe idea. This is an everyday idea so that I give myself the chance to make everyday a Masterpiece day!