Targets, guidelines, and checklists allow organisations to abdicate responsibility for ensuring that they are doing the right things by simply allowing them to report they are doing things right, ticking boxes rather than delivering care.
It would have led to repeated mistakes across management of health services, abdicating responsibility for the correct completion of checklists and targets, while failing to acknowledge human experience.
"The Smart Organisation" contains the same kind of checklists that litter most other management books, such as "the six dimensions of decision quality" and "the nine principles of smart R&D".
"If you spend your vacations armed with too many checklists, you're missing the point of leaving home". 101 Places Not to See Before You Die" (Harper) by Catherine Price is out now.
DSM-III came with checklists of symptoms that allowed straightforward, unambiguous diagnosis.
ReprintsMind and matterThe authors of DSM-V attempt to capture this less than black-and-white picture by dispensing with the approach taken in previous DSMs, which was based on cut-and-dried checklists of symptoms.
Checklists such as the one introduced by Nature should be adopted widely, to help guard against the most common research errors.
Nonetheless, it is useful to track official pledges and see what is achieved.Mr Modi's style of leading through checklists is pragmatic, but not the same as setting out a vision.
Christie's, an auctioneer, says all the wines it auctions are inspected three times by different people, using detailed checklists for condition and authenticity.Fear of fakery has not stopped the boom.
Checklists are what the author describes as a "cognitive net", a mechanism that can help prevent experienced people from making errors due to flawed memory and attention, and ensure that teams work together.
Fear not a troop of volunteers watches the recount armed with six-page checklists.
