The more you talk, the less people listen. (Meg White)


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In his  book 'Deep Survival'  Laurence Gonzales talks at  one point
about one of the factors that does  in young US Navy pilots who are
learning to  land jet aircraft  on the  moving, swaying deck  of an
aircraft carrier at  night. The factor that gets them  in trouble -
and kills a  small percentage of them and nearly  kills many more -
is that despite consciously knowing they should not come in too low
they subconsciously desire so much  to be lower because lower means
'safety' (i.e.,  landing) on a  deep emotional level that  is quite
difficult to override when you're  under enormous stress. They know
to not come  in low, that being  too low is the  greatest danger to
them, but  their own  emotional-subconscious drives  them to  do it
anyway.

Similar problems are  at work undermining the  majority of attempts
at root-cause analysis of quality problems. People are so geared to
find solutions, propose  solutions, get on with  fixing things that
they will begin to work on  'fixing' something that if you ask them
they will admit they do not know the cause and will even claim they
are  working on  root-cause analysis.  They  will do  this even  as
they  are proposing  fixes to  try  out or  even in  the middle  of
implementing them! They  may even tell you that they  know you have
to get to a  root cause before working on solutions  or you have no
real chance of solving the problem - even while they've been saying
they know  it's inadequate drying  of the mold wash  that's causing
the loose  sand defects in  the castings and  the molds need  to be
dried longer.  It is  so comfortable and  comforting to  be talking
about  solutions you  can  implement  that we  skip  right on  over
finding  the cause  first.  Finding and  implementing solutions  is
rewarded. Putting  out fires makes you  a hero. Almost no  one sees
the value of finding the actual  cause and finding a good permanent
solution.




                        NO CARRIER