I really was impressed by the idea the introspection is limited vs experience where (a little bit like a price in an economy) the information about ourselves simply cannot be learned or figured out without exposure to the world and new opportunities.

I learned a lot and there was a lot to think about. Salas (Eds.), Naturalistic decision making, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, pp. Tool retention and fatalities in wildland fire settings: Conceptualizing the naturalistic. The reference to Weick is the original study of firefighter training: Detailed instruction hampers critical thinking and adaptation because the mind is fully occupied in trying to select ‘the’ best option to apply. It seems that detail in the wrong place, or at the wrong level, flatters to deceive. Weick found that the longer the checklists for the wildland firefighters became, the more improvisation was shut down.’ The very shortness of the list gave the firefighters tacit permission-even encouragement-to improvise in the face of unexpected events. As a result, they were open to being taught by experience.

And they knew that experience would teach them how to do the modifying and embellishing. The firefighters could easily remember it, but they knew it needed to be interpreted, modified, and embellished based on circumstance.

The original short list was a general guide. ‘….teaching the firefighters these detailed lists was a factor in decreasing the survival rates. I was especially interested by the discussion of the wild fire fighters because I’d read something about this in an article called ‘ Practical wisdom and organizations’, in which Barry Schwartz describes what happened when the training of wildland firefighters was augmented from just four ‘survival guidelines’ to a list of very nearly 50 items (cases). This was a fabulous conversation – my cycle to work flew by. So the contrarian risks greatly when not conforming for potential high risk gains or losses as the market dictates. It is a feature not a bug that it is difficult mentally and emotionally to vary from them because of their value. Standards and procedures are valuable tools. There is one thing that the podcast did not cover that I think is important. Looking in my own field it is the specific training of being precise and forming procedures that makes abstract elements like project selection and trail and error so difficult.

But almost in every project some amount of non-standard or non-procedure has to be implemented to complete the project. It is also critical that the construction plans and contract documents be formed in a manner that delivers clarity to the parties to the construction contract. It is impossible to derive everything from first principles on each task. Superb, great subject, knowledgeable guest and a spirit of exploration.Īs an engineer, much of what I do is standardize and follows procedures which are critical to functioning.

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