Premortem

I recently finished reading Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. In the book Kahneman touches on a managerial strategy called premortem, during which he references the thought-leader of the subject, Gary Klein. Essentially, premortem is the opposite of postmortem. Gary Klein describes "Performing a Project Premortem" in the Harvard Business Review and goes into detail on the concept, which can be read here. However, this excerpt from Thinking, Fast and Slow paints a vivid picture of the idea as well:

The procedure is simple: when the organization has almost come to an important decision but has not formally committed itself, Klein proposes gathering for a brief session a group of individuals who are knowledgeable about the decision. The premise of the session is a short speech: "Imagine that we are a year into the future. We implemented the plan as it now exists. The outcome was a disaster. Please take 5 to 10 minutes to write a brief history of that disaster."

I can immediately envision many useful applications of this exercise. Mainly, it can help both proponents and opponents of a decision brainstorm using prospective hindsight, which can improve accuracy in identifying reasons for future outcomes.

While Thinking, Fast and Slow contained many excellent thoughts and ideas, this concept of premortem stood out to me because of the hindsight aspect which offers benefits that other risk analysis methods do not.

- Joe