I love when lessons are wrapped up in good stories, like in the book The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande.

One story described Van Halen’s concert contracts.  These contracts clearly request a bowl of M&M’s “with all the brown candies removed, upon pain of forfeiture of the show, with full compensation to the band”.   The story goes on to say that Van Halen actually followed through on this clause at least once.

 My first reaction to this was: “Wow – another example of a ridiculous rock star request”.  But my reaction changed as I read more …

Van Halen’s theory was that if the M&M’s clause is overlooked, other critical clauses might also be overlooked.  When the band walked out on the concert noted above, it wasn’t because of the M&M’s.  It was because the venue had failed to read the weight requirements leading to a high risk of the staging falling through the arena floor.  When the band saw the brown M&M’s, they started looking into other details.  When I think about it this way, the M&M’s clause is a brilliant idea. 

Van Halen’s contracts are checklists, comprised of many, many details.  The M&M’s clause simply helps to determine how well the concert venue follows the checklist.  The Checklist Manifesto goes on to demonstrate case after case where complex situations benefit from a simple checklist.

Many of us deal with complicated jobs: we may need to track hundreds of different tasks.  A checklist (or a To Do List) is the best way to track all of these tasks.

Tune in to my next blog when I talk about how to create the perfect To Do List.