A retired astronaut shared a few pieces of life advice on NPR the other day, and I couldn't help but think how this type of thinking would benefit some of the biggest decision makers in healthcare.
Commander Chris Hadfield has flown three space missions and was the first Canadian to walk in space. He went on NPR to discuss his new book, "An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth." The interview was one of the more fascinating things I've heard in recent weeks.
When a space shuttle launches for a six-month flight, the first few minutes are actually the most important on whether they will make it back. Commander Hadfield said half the risk of a six-month flight is in those first nine minutes. Knowing this, how do astronauts remain composed and focused on the tasks at hand?
It comes to breaking down risks. Astronauts are constantly reminding themselves of the next thing that could kill them. It might be an inadvertent engine shutdown, the staging of when the rockets come off the craft or some other system failure.
But identifying risks is only part of the process: Astronauts then have to analyze whatever could kill them. They "go into every excruciating detail of why that might affect what we're doing and what we can do to resolve it," and they must then develop a plan of action and practice it until they are comfortable.
Commander Hadfield doesn't think astronauts are any braver than other people, but just meticulously prepared. "We dissect what it is that is going to scare us and what it is that is a threat to us, and then we practice over and over again so that the natural, irrational fear is neutralized," he said.
While all of this insight was fascinating, the following was my favorite piece of wisdom in the 43-minute interview: "And your first reaction is not just to scream and flee with your hands waving over your head, but in fact, to go, 'Hey, we thought about this, and I know that this is dangerous, but there are six things that I could do right now, all of which will help make things better.'"
Last week I watched portions of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's hearing with HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius about the error-riddled healthcare.gov website. Republicans and Democrats alike spent a significant amount of time asking Ms. Sebelius questions that had nothing to do with the website, such as whether President Barack Obama was her boss and why Colorado's advertisements for its exchange featured beer. The session, which lasted more than three hours, was not solution-oriented.
Commander Hadfield's advice is two-pronged. One is anticipating things that might kill you. For HHS, this would be anticipating what could go wrong with the launch of healthcare.gov. At this point, it's safe to say the agency's risk assessment was deeply flawed. Secretary Sebelius took the blame in the hearing last week, but her accountability doesn't make up for what seems to be a pretty big communication and IT breakdown.
The commander's second piece of advice, approaching problems in a calm, measured and solution-minded manner, was nowhere to be found in that hearing room last week. Few opted to take the approach of, "What can we do to make this better?" Rather, politicians opted to point fingers, make odd metaphors and ask rhetorical questions. It became vaudeville.
This isn't much of a surprise, given Congress' track record as of late, but watching such banter after hearing Commander Hadfield's thoughts about problem-solving made the healthcare.gov debacle and its subsequent problem-solving seem all the more absurd. It's interesting how such clear thinking is reserved for life-or-death moments. How many problems would be better solved in healthcare, and many other industries, if Commander Hadfield's advice wasn't reserved for takeoffs and moonwalks?