How often does this happen? You’re running a process that you’ve successfully run a million times, but this time it fails.
As kids, we were always told, when approaching a railroad crossing, to STOP, LOOK, and LISTEN. When evaluating the integrity of a process, we think you should do that as well…
Under these circumstances, It’s easy to think the process no longer works, and must be changed. And it might be that you’re right. But did you thoroughly check your assumptions?
When something either doesn’t work, or stops working, don’t make a hasty change without checking to make sure that a change is really necessary.
Ask some questions:
- Did everyone involved really do what they said they were going to do?
- Was something substituted?
- Did something get left out?
- Did something change in the environment (a new staff member, connected software, etc.)?
- Was the entire process followed with integrity, start to finish?
You might uncover an underlying problem as you ask yourself these questions. Now you can take more targeted corrections, and get that process functioning again.
Check your assumptions. You’ll be better off in the long run…
