The Power of Checklists

October 30, 1935. Wright Field, Ohio. The Boeing Model 299, predecessor to the B-17, lifted off for an Army acceptance flight. Five experienced crew aboard. One of the Army's most experienced test pilots at the controls. The airplane climbed three hundred feet, stalled, rolled, and crashed. Two killed, including the pilot.

The cause was not engine failure. Not weather. Not pilot error in the dramatic sense.

The gust lock was still engaged. A wooden device installed to lock the control surfaces while parked. The pilot, distracted by the four engines and the complexity of a brand new aircraft, forgot to release it before takeoff.

The press called the Model 299 too much airplane for one man to fly. Boeing nearly lost the contract.

The Army's response was not to demand more pilot training. The pilots were already the best in the country. The response was a piece of paper. A preflight checklist. A short list of the things any pilot would obviously remember, until the day he did not.

Today every aircraft flown has a checklist. Not because pilots are dumb. Because complexity beats memory, every time.

Here is the leadership lesson. A checklist is not a confession of incompetence. It is the recognition that skilled people, working in complex systems, will forget the one item that wrecks everything. Smart people refuse checklists because they think the list is for amateurs. Wise people use checklists because they have watched smart people crash airplanes.

What is your gust lock? The thing you would obviously remember, the thing your team would obviously remember, until the morning you do not?

Write it down.

Don’t settle. Be relentless.

— Hunter