December 3, 2024 • 20 mins
What if the dreaded corrective action process could be transformed into a beacon of opportunity? Join us as we introduce and explore the "Four I's of the Corrective Action Process" concept. This fresh approach transforms common sense ideas into a memorable strategy that enhances the understanding of the process while keeping continual improvement as its focus.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kim Swanson (00:03):
Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A.
We're taking time to discussconstruction materials, testing
and inspection with people inthe know.
From exploring testing problemsand solutions to laboratory
best practices and qualitymanagement, we're covering
topics important to you.
Brian Johnson (00:20):
Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A.
I'm Brian Johnson.
Kim Swanson (00:23):
And I'm Kim Swanson , and we are here to talk about
everyone's favorite subject thecorrective action process.
Brian Johnson (00:31):
Who doesn't like owning up to their mistakes?
People love doing it, and notonly do you get to own up to it,
you get to have a painful,exhaustive investigation of the
thing that was screwed up.
But the good news is it leadsto continual improvement.
Kim Swanson (00:51):
It does and I was obviously joking.
I know this is not everyone'sfavorite subject, but I think it
could be.
I think this should be people'snot.
They should not have thenegative connotations with the
corrective action processbecause, as you said, it really
does help the organization to bebetter and personally be better
.
So I think it's, I think it'sgood all the way around and I
(01:12):
think we have something todaythat might help people love this
a little bit more.
Brian Johnson (01:19):
Yeah, we do, and this we're going to talk about.
What I'm going to let you sayit.
(03:39):
one of the presentations hadthis and they talked about this
and I was like that is awesome.
So they did not.
They did not refer to it as thefour eyes of the corrective
action process, but I'm leaninginto this because I think it is
hilarious and memorable.
I think that's and those arethings that are useful.
It's memorable and pretty funny.
(04:00):
It is, as a glasses wearing human.
Is that?
What is that?
What triggered this?
Four eyes of corrective action?
Kim Swanson (04:10):
Yeah, yeah, I just it was.
It was just a happy accident.
I mean it could have been, youknow, the four F's of, or G's of
it, or depending on the words,but they were all keywords of
eyes and I'm like let's justlean into it, let's lean into
the four eyes of everything.
Brian Johnson (04:28):
I love it so much I like it too, and it's funny
because how these things evolveis interesting to me.
Occasionally, I do like readingsome of these books or listening
to them in audio form, but, uh,every once in a while I'll hear
about this, this either like abusiness book, or a quality book
(04:49):
, or some kind ofself-improvement book that
catches my interest, or at leastthe summary of it, or there'll
be some hype about it, and thenI'll read it, or or listen to it
, depending on how I consume it,and then I'll find out it's
just stuff I already knew orwhat would be considered to be
(05:09):
common sense.
There's one that reallyirritates me that somebody was
pushing hard for me to read andall it boiled down to was if you
don't want to forget stuff, youshould write it down, and I'm
(05:30):
like that's a Post-it note,that's not a book, like I don't
need to read a book to then giveme all of these explanations
about times when people wrotethings down and did them.
Like that's great, and I cannotbelieve somebody is is making
money off that, but they, theydid, and so maybe one day, kim,
(05:51):
you will be the uh, some sort ofquality guru because of the
four eyes of corrective actionand I will I'll always pronounce
it the four eyes instead of thefour eyes?
Kim Swanson (06:04):
yeah, no, I think I think it's funnier it's funnier
.
It's funnier that way and Ithink we had a little bit of
this conversation when we weretalking about goal setting.
In that episode we talked aboutgoal setting, of how you didn't
like forced acronyms and thingslike that.
But I will say sometimes itdoes help.
It may not help you, but it mayhelp other people just to hear
(06:28):
the same stuff they know in adifferent way, just to consume
it in a different way.
And so, while you may befamiliar with the four I's of
the corrective action process,seeing them this way or hearing
about them this way may help youremember them so you don't have
to write them down.
It could be, you know so I mean,I think there's some people
that it does help just hearingthe same information just in a
(06:50):
different way, and then where itmaybe didn't click before.
So I'm all about how manydifferent ways can I say the
same thing to my detriment, Ithink.
But that that is one of them.
So let's get into the four I'sof the corrective action process
.
Brian Johnson (07:08):
Okay, Okay, All right.
Number one ice cream.
I always find that when I'm ina bad mood because I did
something wrong, ice cream helps.
So that's obviously the firsteye of the four eyes.
Kim Swanson (07:24):
No, I'm going to say no, that is not the first
eye.
The first eye is immediateaction.
You need to do something rightaway to put a band-aid on the
problem, so to speak.
Brian Johnson (07:35):
That is true and basically in terms of our
industry, the materials testingindustry, let's say you had a
piece of equipment that wasdelivering faulty results, your
immediate action might be totake it out of service.
Stop what you're doing, take itout of service, put the other
(08:00):
one in service and keep rolling,or just pause all work until
you figure out what's going on.
At that point you reallyhaven't done much of a root
cause analysis.
You've just stopped thebleeding right or put a bandaid
on it cause analysis.
You've just stopped the bleedingright or put a bandaid on it.
Unfortunately, that first eyeis where a lot of people stop
and if you think about that,we're only 25% into this journey
(08:24):
of corrective action and somepeople have already they've
declared themselves that they'realready.
Kim Swanson (08:30):
Well, we don't want to be a cyclops.
We need more than one eye forthis process.
So the next eye, after you'vedone the immediate action again,
the bandage on the bleeding itis identify the root cause of a
problem.
That is easier said than donesometimes, isn't it, brian?
Brian Johnson (08:55):
It is because sometimes it's not just one
thing and we have tried tochange the way we talk about
root cause a little bit at AshtoResource and this kind of
evolved over the last couple ofyears where we had always been
giving these presentations aboutroot cause analysis and
corrective action and we'dalways focus on this root cause
and then Tracy had gone to someconference and she came back and
we'd always focus on this rootcause and then tracy had gone to
(09:15):
some conference and she cameback and she said you know, we
talked too much about root cause, we should talk more about
causal factors.
And I said you know what?
You're right, because I can'teven tell you how many times
I've taken corrective action andI and I'm like the one thing I
will say to people is no matterwhat you ask me, why is this?
(09:37):
It's never one thing.
Why did you do that?
It's never one reason.
It's a bunch of reasons that wedid this, or it's a bunch of
things that went wrong or it's abunch of whatever it is.
So if you really think moreabout all of those causal
factors that played into it, youmay identify one root cause,
like at the very top of that,but you might identify a bunch
(09:59):
of little things that you haveto take care of and there are
different mechanisms forevaluating that.
I know some people like thefishbone diagram as a way to lay
all that out and kind ofexplore all the potential causes
, and you can do that.
You can do it whatever wayworks for you really.
But you do have to have tothink beyond the oh it's broken,
(10:23):
I fixed it, we're good to go,let's keep rolling.
Think about what might be thelarger root cause of those
problems.
Kim Swanson (10:32):
Yeah, and that leads right into the third eye
of the corrective action process, and that's implementing a
solution that corrects the rootcause as to prevent its
reoccurrence, and I emphasizeprevent, because that is really
what the root cause analysis isright Like you need.
What can you do differently toprevent this from happening in
(10:54):
the future?
Brian Johnson (10:55):
Yeah, and that takes you way beyond immediate
action If you start thinkingabout making sure that you're
preventing it from happeningagain and I do I do find this to
be a really when you have a bigproblem, it's hard to get this
right and you're not alwaysgoing to get this right, but you
endeavor to do it and that'spart of your process.
So one issue that that comes upfrom time to time for us is is
(11:22):
issues with timeliness on theaccreditation program and I
there.
There's so many factorsinvolved in that that it's very
hard to prevent it fromrecurring and even if things are
working really well, invariablysomething changes that foils
(11:42):
our plan of correcting it forthe long run.
But you know, you just keep,you keep trying and you keep
going after that, trying toprevent recurrence of a problem.
Kim Swanson (11:53):
Yeah, I think that's really the whole reason
of the corrective action processis to prevent it from going any
further.
But that was only the third eye.
The fourth eye in this processis improving the processes in
place within an organization sothat the problems do not recur
Again.
The recurring is a recurringtheme here.
Brian Johnson (12:15):
Yeah, so it's not just taking the action, you
also have to change what you'redoing.
One way that's good to do thatis to write it down.
So one thing we do so I wasjust talking about this, right
Writing it down it helps right.
(12:36):
So I could see why that personmade so much money off that book
about writing it down.
The way we write things down isthrough our QMS.
So we have a quality managementsystem that has policies and
procedures and if we are makinga change to one of our processes
, we want to make sure thatthose QMS documents are up to
date.
If we have policy that'soutward facing to our customers,
(12:56):
we want to update that as well.
You have to know where allthese things are so that you can
update them properly.
If there's communication youhave to have with customers or
with staff or with otherinterested parties, you would do
that as well as part of thatchange to your process.
Kim Swanson (13:13):
So can you dive into the difference for me and
for us, about the differencebetween implementing a solution
that corrects the root cause andprevents its reoccurrence
versus improving the processesin place within an organization
so that the problems do notreoccur?
What's really the bigdifference between the third and
(13:34):
fourth eye in this process?
Brian Johnson (13:37):
Boy, that's a really good question.
I think that what you're doingin the third eye is still you're
still focused on yourresolution of that problem right
, resolution of that problem.
But I think that fourth eyetakes you to let's retool, like,
(14:00):
let's look at the largerpicture here and think about any
process improvements that wecould make, not just to prevent
recurrence but to just reallykind of move on from that
entirely and just change theyou're changing your path
(14:22):
forward so that it really shouldnot happen again.
So while you're still changingyour process, it's like one step
further in that process.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I might take a correctiveaction, but I don't necessarily
change my processes and updatemy QMS to reflect what that
(14:44):
issue was.
This is like a more wholesalechange.
Is that what you're thinking?
Kim Swanson (14:50):
about or were you?
Brian Johnson (14:51):
thinking about some other angle to it.
Kim Swanson (14:53):
No.
So what I'm hearing is that theimplementing a solution that
corrects the root cause is stilltalking about that one instance
that triggered this root causethe corrective action process.
So it's still the third eye isstill thinking about the trigger
of this process, where thefourth eye is thinking of
potential ways that this couldbe impacting other processes
(15:16):
that did not necessarily triggerit.
But it is more of a holisticapproach about it.
Is that what you said?
Brian Johnson (15:24):
Yeah, that is a big part of it.
I think that you touched on theone part of the tendrils that
kind of come out from thatsolution and how that impacts
your overall quality managementand kind of get into.
When you start revising any ofthose quality documents, those
things become more apparent toyou.
(15:45):
So then you're thinking beyondjust the resolution of that
issue and you're thinking aboutyour whole system.
So that's what makes sense tome about that fourth eye.
But there's really, you know,when people talk about
corrective action, that lastpart that they talk about is
usually the monitoringactivities, and those monitoring
(16:08):
activities could be part ofthat fourth eye too.
So if you change, okay, like Ican give you an example.
Let's say we've this is like along time since this came up,
but okay, our accreditationprocess, we have a peer review
system way, way back when weprobably didn't have a peer
(16:32):
review system, right.
So it was like, okay, you makethese changes, update the
directory.
If there's a problem, we'llfind out about it later.
Kim Swanson (16:42):
Yeah.
Brian Johnson (16:42):
Not a big deal, but no, it is a big deal.
So one way you can ensure thatyou don't have those problems or
you have a better chance ofensuring I'm never going to say
100% on anything, because humansdo make mistakes is implement
this peer review process so thatthat reduces your risk of error
(17:04):
.
But you wouldn't, let's say Iwas just looking at the error.
That started the wholeconversation.
I might say, oh well, you know,for that situation we probably
should have looked at that, ormaybe that person should have
looked at it again.
But then you start looking atlike, okay, well, let's look at
(17:25):
all of the things we're doingand should those have that?
So like, look at us now.
We've got peer review forassessments, assessment reports.
We've got peer review forassessments, assessment reports.
We've got peer review foraccreditation files.
We have measures in place.
Okay, let's look at thecorrective action form.
Tracy worked on the correctiveaction form.
(17:46):
She's like oh, I should have apeer take a look at it.
So she sends it to me and I sayI'm not reliable.
Let's ask Kim a look at it.
So she sends it to me and I sayI'm not reliable, let's ask Kim
to look at it too, because notonly do we want it, we want to
make sure that it makes sense tome and it's accurate.
We also want to make sure itmakes sense to other people.
So let's get another peerinvolved.
So I think we've really figuredout a way to work together in
(18:11):
our organization and rely on ourpeers to make uh, to, to double
check us and to think aboutthings that we might not be
thinking about when we look atit not just editing but, uh,
different audiences that we'retrying to reach, um.
So I think we've kind ofchanged our process and it's
really affected the entireorganization and how we do
things.
There's very little that I willput out there without having
(18:36):
somebody review it first.
Even these episodes, we mostlyreview them.
I wouldn't say I always listento them before they go out there
, but most of them we do look atthem or the guests will listen
to it to make sure that theyfeel that they're comfortable
with it, so that that kind of uhprocess change had really uh
(18:57):
permeated the entireorganization over the years yeah
, and I definitely listened tothese uh episodes before I
review them, because you have to, because I edited them.
Kim Swanson (19:09):
Yes but yeah, so so I think we covered most of the
four.
I think we covered this inpretty decent detail.
(19:50):
But again, as I mentioned before, this topic was talked about
not the four I's but thecorrective action process in
that one.
But again, as I mentionedbefore, this topic was talked
about not before ICE, but thecorrective action process and
root cause analysis was talkedabout at the 2024 and, I'm sure,
the 2023 at some point.
We talk about this at everytechnical exchange and, as we
are gearing up for the 2025, atthe time of this recording, I
(20:12):
wanted to make sure everyoneknew that the 2025 AASHTO
Resource Technical Exchange iscoming up March 17th through the
20th in Bellevue, washington.
So I just wanted to make sureeveryone is aware of that, and
you can find more information ataashtoresourceorg.
Slash events.
Brian Johnson (20:31):
Sounds good, and I was just curious.
You know, since we're talkingabout four eyes, one thing that
is not in the in the four eyesis a word that is a synonym for
regret.
I looked up all the synonymsfor regret that I could think
about and I don't see any eyesin there, because you should not
have any regrets about takingcorrective action or owning up
(20:54):
to your mistakes and facing themhead on so you can avoid them
in the future.
So keep that in mind.
It's a great process.
I do occasionally when I'mworking on corrective actions.
I do get irritated because Ifind that some of the complaints
(21:15):
we get are unjustified, but Ido not let that irritation last
for long.
That is part of my grievingprocess when I'm dealing with
taking corrective actions, butit's over very short, and I
never regret what we've learnedfrom the corrective action
process, and I hope you don'teither.
Kim Swanson (21:35):
Yeah, it's not the five eyes, it's the four eyes,
so irritation is not in there.
Well, it's a valid feeling.
Brian Johnson (21:43):
It is a valid feeling.
It's a valid feeling.
Kim Swanson (21:46):
It's okay.
You can be irritated.
However, know that good thingswill come out of it.
Brian Johnson (21:50):
That's right.
Yeah, just don't let that takeover.
Kim Swanson (21:54):
Well, thanks, Brian , for taking time to talk about
this with us today.
Brian Johnson (21:58):
Thanks for bringing it up and being the
thought leader.
Another thing I hate that termthe thought leader as it comes
to the four eyes of correctiveaction.
Kim Swanson (22:12):
Yes, thanks for listening to AASHTO Resource Q&A
.
If you'd like to be a guest orjust submit a question, send us
an email at podcast atAASHTOresourceorg, or call Brian
at 240-436-4820.
For other news and relatedcontent, check out AASHTO
(22:33):
Resources social media accountsor go to AASHTOResourceorg.
Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A.
We're taking time to discussconstruction materials, testing
and inspection with people inthe know.
From exploring testing problemsand solutions to laboratory
best practices and qualitymanagement, we're covering
topics important to you.
Brian Johnson (00:20):
Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A.
I'm Brian Johnson.
Kim Swanson (00:23):
And I'm Kim Swanson , and we are here to talk about
everyone's favorite subject thecorrective action process.
Brian Johnson (00:31):
Who doesn't like owning up to their mistakes?
People love doing it, and notonly do you get to own up to it,
you get to have a painful,exhaustive investigation of the
thing that was screwed up.
But the good news is it leadsto continual improvement.
Kim Swanson (00:51):
It does and I was obviously joking.
I know this is not everyone'sfavorite subject, but I think it
could be.
I think this should be people'snot.
They should not have thenegative connotations with the
corrective action processbecause, as you said, it really
does help the organization to bebetter and personally be better
.
So I think it's, I think it'sgood all the way around and I
(01:12):
think we have something todaythat might help people love this
a little bit more.
Brian Johnson (01:19):
Yeah, we do, and this we're going to talk about.
What I'm going to let you sayit.
(03:39):
one of the presentations hadthis and they talked about this
and I was like that is awesome.
So they did not.
They did not refer to it as thefour eyes of the corrective
action process, but I'm leaninginto this because I think it is
hilarious and memorable.
I think that's and those arethings that are useful.
It's memorable and pretty funny.
(04:00):
It is, as a glasses wearing human.
Is that?
What is that?
What triggered this?
Four eyes of corrective action?
Kim Swanson (04:10):
Yeah, yeah, I just it was.
It was just a happy accident.
I mean it could have been, youknow, the four F's of, or G's of
it, or depending on the words,but they were all keywords of
eyes and I'm like let's justlean into it, let's lean into
the four eyes of everything.
Brian Johnson (04:28):
I love it so much I like it too, and it's funny
because how these things evolveis interesting to me.
Occasionally, I do like readingsome of these books or listening
to them in audio form, but, uh,every once in a while I'll hear
about this, this either like abusiness book, or a quality book
(04:49):
, or some kind ofself-improvement book that
catches my interest, or at leastthe summary of it, or there'll
be some hype about it, and thenI'll read it, or or listen to it
, depending on how I consume it,and then I'll find out it's
just stuff I already knew orwhat would be considered to be
(05:09):
common sense.
There's one that reallyirritates me that somebody was
pushing hard for me to read andall it boiled down to was if you
don't want to forget stuff, youshould write it down, and I'm
(05:30):
like that's a Post-it note,that's not a book, like I don't
need to read a book to then giveme all of these explanations
about times when people wrotethings down and did them.
Like that's great, and I cannotbelieve somebody is is making
money off that, but they, theydid, and so maybe one day, kim,
(05:51):
you will be the uh, some sort ofquality guru because of the
four eyes of corrective actionand I will I'll always pronounce
it the four eyes instead of thefour eyes?
Kim Swanson (06:04):
yeah, no, I think I think it's funnier it's funnier
.
It's funnier that way and Ithink we had a little bit of
this conversation when we weretalking about goal setting.
In that episode we talked aboutgoal setting, of how you didn't
like forced acronyms and thingslike that.
But I will say sometimes itdoes help.
It may not help you, but it mayhelp other people just to hear
(06:28):
the same stuff they know in adifferent way, just to consume
it in a different way.
And so, while you may befamiliar with the four I's of
the corrective action process,seeing them this way or hearing
about them this way may help youremember them so you don't have
to write them down.
It could be, you know so I mean,I think there's some people
that it does help just hearingthe same information just in a
(06:50):
different way, and then where itmaybe didn't click before.
So I'm all about how manydifferent ways can I say the
same thing to my detriment, Ithink.
But that that is one of them.
So let's get into the four I'sof the corrective action process
.
Brian Johnson (07:08):
Okay, Okay, All right.
Number one ice cream.
I always find that when I'm ina bad mood because I did
something wrong, ice cream helps.
So that's obviously the firsteye of the four eyes.
Kim Swanson (07:24):
No, I'm going to say no, that is not the first
eye.
The first eye is immediateaction.
You need to do something rightaway to put a band-aid on the
problem, so to speak.
Brian Johnson (07:35):
That is true and basically in terms of our
industry, the materials testingindustry, let's say you had a
piece of equipment that wasdelivering faulty results, your
immediate action might be totake it out of service.
Stop what you're doing, take itout of service, put the other
(08:00):
one in service and keep rolling,or just pause all work until
you figure out what's going on.
At that point you reallyhaven't done much of a root
cause analysis.
You've just stopped thebleeding right or put a bandaid
on it cause analysis.
You've just stopped the bleedingright or put a bandaid on it.
Unfortunately, that first eyeis where a lot of people stop
and if you think about that,we're only 25% into this journey
(08:24):
of corrective action and somepeople have already they've
declared themselves that they'realready.
Kim Swanson (08:30):
Well, we don't want to be a cyclops.
We need more than one eye forthis process.
So the next eye, after you'vedone the immediate action again,
the bandage on the bleeding itis identify the root cause of a
problem.
That is easier said than donesometimes, isn't it, brian?
Brian Johnson (08:55):
It is because sometimes it's not just one
thing and we have tried tochange the way we talk about
root cause a little bit at AshtoResource and this kind of
evolved over the last couple ofyears where we had always been
giving these presentations aboutroot cause analysis and
corrective action and we'dalways focus on this root cause
and then Tracy had gone to someconference and she came back and
we'd always focus on this rootcause and then tracy had gone to
(09:15):
some conference and she cameback and she said you know, we
talked too much about root cause, we should talk more about
causal factors.
And I said you know what?
You're right, because I can'teven tell you how many times
I've taken corrective action andI and I'm like the one thing I
will say to people is no matterwhat you ask me, why is this?
(09:37):
It's never one thing.
Why did you do that?
It's never one reason.
It's a bunch of reasons that wedid this, or it's a bunch of
things that went wrong or it's abunch of whatever it is.
So if you really think moreabout all of those causal
factors that played into it, youmay identify one root cause,
like at the very top of that,but you might identify a bunch
(09:59):
of little things that you haveto take care of and there are
different mechanisms forevaluating that.
I know some people like thefishbone diagram as a way to lay
all that out and kind ofexplore all the potential causes
, and you can do that.
You can do it whatever wayworks for you really.
But you do have to have tothink beyond the oh it's broken,
(10:23):
I fixed it, we're good to go,let's keep rolling.
Think about what might be thelarger root cause of those
problems.
Kim Swanson (10:32):
Yeah, and that leads right into the third eye
of the corrective action process, and that's implementing a
solution that corrects the rootcause as to prevent its
reoccurrence, and I emphasizeprevent, because that is really
what the root cause analysis isright Like you need.
What can you do differently toprevent this from happening in
(10:54):
the future?
Brian Johnson (10:55):
Yeah, and that takes you way beyond immediate
action If you start thinkingabout making sure that you're
preventing it from happeningagain and I do I do find this to
be a really when you have a bigproblem, it's hard to get this
right and you're not alwaysgoing to get this right, but you
endeavor to do it and that'spart of your process.
So one issue that that comes upfrom time to time for us is is
(11:22):
issues with timeliness on theaccreditation program and I
there.
There's so many factorsinvolved in that that it's very
hard to prevent it fromrecurring and even if things are
working really well, invariablysomething changes that foils
(11:42):
our plan of correcting it forthe long run.
But you know, you just keep,you keep trying and you keep
going after that, trying toprevent recurrence of a problem.
Kim Swanson (11:53):
Yeah, I think that's really the whole reason
of the corrective action processis to prevent it from going any
further.
But that was only the third eye.
The fourth eye in this processis improving the processes in
place within an organization sothat the problems do not recur
Again.
The recurring is a recurringtheme here.
Brian Johnson (12:15):
Yeah, so it's not just taking the action, you
also have to change what you'redoing.
One way that's good to do thatis to write it down.
So one thing we do so I wasjust talking about this, right
Writing it down it helps right.
(12:36):
So I could see why that personmade so much money off that book
about writing it down.
The way we write things down isthrough our QMS.
So we have a quality managementsystem that has policies and
procedures and if we are makinga change to one of our processes
, we want to make sure thatthose QMS documents are up to
date.
If we have policy that'soutward facing to our customers,
(12:56):
we want to update that as well.
You have to know where allthese things are so that you can
update them properly.
If there's communication youhave to have with customers or
with staff or with otherinterested parties, you would do
that as well as part of thatchange to your process.
Kim Swanson (13:13):
So can you dive into the difference for me and
for us, about the differencebetween implementing a solution
that corrects the root cause andprevents its reoccurrence
versus improving the processesin place within an organization
so that the problems do notreoccur?
What's really the bigdifference between the third and
(13:34):
fourth eye in this process?
Brian Johnson (13:37):
Boy, that's a really good question.
I think that what you're doingin the third eye is still you're
still focused on yourresolution of that problem right
, resolution of that problem.
But I think that fourth eyetakes you to let's retool, like,
(14:00):
let's look at the largerpicture here and think about any
process improvements that wecould make, not just to prevent
recurrence but to just reallykind of move on from that
entirely and just change theyou're changing your path
(14:22):
forward so that it really shouldnot happen again.
So while you're still changingyour process, it's like one step
further in that process.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I might take a correctiveaction, but I don't necessarily
change my processes and updatemy QMS to reflect what that
(14:44):
issue was.
This is like a more wholesalechange.
Is that what you're thinking?
Kim Swanson (14:50):
about or were you?
Brian Johnson (14:51):
thinking about some other angle to it.
Kim Swanson (14:53):
No.
So what I'm hearing is that theimplementing a solution that
corrects the root cause is stilltalking about that one instance
that triggered this root causethe corrective action process.
So it's still the third eye isstill thinking about the trigger
of this process, where thefourth eye is thinking of
potential ways that this couldbe impacting other processes
(15:16):
that did not necessarily triggerit.
But it is more of a holisticapproach about it.
Is that what you said?
Brian Johnson (15:24):
Yeah, that is a big part of it.
I think that you touched on theone part of the tendrils that
kind of come out from thatsolution and how that impacts
your overall quality managementand kind of get into.
When you start revising any ofthose quality documents, those
things become more apparent toyou.
(15:45):
So then you're thinking beyondjust the resolution of that
issue and you're thinking aboutyour whole system.
So that's what makes sense tome about that fourth eye.
But there's really, you know,when people talk about
corrective action, that lastpart that they talk about is
usually the monitoringactivities, and those monitoring
(16:08):
activities could be part ofthat fourth eye too.
So if you change, okay, like Ican give you an example.
Let's say we've this is like along time since this came up,
but okay, our accreditationprocess, we have a peer review
system way, way back when weprobably didn't have a peer
(16:32):
review system, right.
So it was like, okay, you makethese changes, update the
directory.
If there's a problem, we'llfind out about it later.
Kim Swanson (16:42):
Yeah.
Brian Johnson (16:42):
Not a big deal, but no, it is a big deal.
So one way you can ensure thatyou don't have those problems or
you have a better chance ofensuring I'm never going to say
100% on anything, because humansdo make mistakes is implement
this peer review process so thatthat reduces your risk of error
(17:04):
.
But you wouldn't, let's say Iwas just looking at the error.
That started the wholeconversation.
I might say, oh well, you know,for that situation we probably
should have looked at that, ormaybe that person should have
looked at it again.
But then you start looking atlike, okay, well, let's look at
(17:25):
all of the things we're doingand should those have that?
So like, look at us now.
We've got peer review forassessments, assessment reports.
We've got peer review forassessments, assessment reports.
We've got peer review foraccreditation files.
We have measures in place.
Okay, let's look at thecorrective action form.
Tracy worked on the correctiveaction form.
(17:46):
She's like oh, I should have apeer take a look at it.
So she sends it to me and I sayI'm not reliable.
Let's ask Kim a look at it.
So she sends it to me and I sayI'm not reliable, let's ask Kim
to look at it too, because notonly do we want it, we want to
make sure that it makes sense tome and it's accurate.
We also want to make sure itmakes sense to other people.
So let's get another peerinvolved.
So I think we've really figuredout a way to work together in
(18:11):
our organization and rely on ourpeers to make uh, to, to double
check us and to think aboutthings that we might not be
thinking about when we look atit not just editing but, uh,
different audiences that we'retrying to reach, um.
So I think we've kind ofchanged our process and it's
really affected the entireorganization and how we do
things.
There's very little that I willput out there without having
(18:36):
somebody review it first.
Even these episodes, we mostlyreview them.
I wouldn't say I always listento them before they go out there
, but most of them we do look atthem or the guests will listen
to it to make sure that theyfeel that they're comfortable
with it, so that that kind of uhprocess change had really uh
(18:57):
permeated the entireorganization over the years yeah
, and I definitely listened tothese uh episodes before I
review them, because you have to, because I edited them.
Kim Swanson (19:09):
Yes but yeah, so so I think we covered most of the
four.
I think we covered this inpretty decent detail.
(19:50):
But again, as I mentioned before, this topic was talked about
not the four I's but thecorrective action process in
that one.
But again, as I mentionedbefore, this topic was talked
about not before ICE, but thecorrective action process and
root cause analysis was talkedabout at the 2024 and, I'm sure,
the 2023 at some point.
We talk about this at everytechnical exchange and, as we
are gearing up for the 2025, atthe time of this recording, I
(20:12):
wanted to make sure everyoneknew that the 2025 AASHTO
Resource Technical Exchange iscoming up March 17th through the
20th in Bellevue, washington.
So I just wanted to make sureeveryone is aware of that, and
you can find more information ataashtoresourceorg.
Slash events.
Brian Johnson (20:31):
Sounds good, and I was just curious.
You know, since we're talkingabout four eyes, one thing that
is not in the in the four eyesis a word that is a synonym for
regret.
I looked up all the synonymsfor regret that I could think
about and I don't see any eyesin there, because you should not
have any regrets about takingcorrective action or owning up
(20:54):
to your mistakes and facing themhead on so you can avoid them
in the future.
So keep that in mind.
It's a great process.
I do occasionally when I'mworking on corrective actions.
I do get irritated because Ifind that some of the complaints
(21:15):
we get are unjustified, but Ido not let that irritation last
for long.
That is part of my grievingprocess when I'm dealing with
taking corrective actions, butit's over very short, and I
never regret what we've learnedfrom the corrective action
process, and I hope you don'teither.
Kim Swanson (21:35):
Yeah, it's not the five eyes, it's the four eyes,
so irritation is not in there.
Well, it's a valid feeling.
Brian Johnson (21:43):
It is a valid feeling.
It's a valid feeling.
Kim Swanson (21:46):
It's okay.
You can be irritated.
However, know that good thingswill come out of it.
Brian Johnson (21:50):
That's right.
Yeah, just don't let that takeover.
Kim Swanson (21:54):
Well, thanks, Brian , for taking time to talk about
this with us today.
Brian Johnson (21:58):
Thanks for bringing it up and being the
thought leader.
Another thing I hate that termthe thought leader as it comes
to the four eyes of correctiveaction.
Kim Swanson (22:12):
Yes, thanks for listening to AASHTO Resource Q&A
.
If you'd like to be a guest orjust submit a question, send us
an email at podcast atAASHTOresourceorg, or call Brian
at 240-436-4820.
For other news and relatedcontent, check out AASHTO
(22:33):
Resources social media accountsor go to AASHTOResourceorg.
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