As complexity rises, two effects emerge. First, the number of event paths or possible scenarios increase. This means that the probability that the event will follow a familiar, well-practiced trajectory decreases. Second, the probability that we may encounter an unexpectedly extreme or hazardous event trajectory increases. Simply stated, as complexity rises more potential scenarios can happen and more of them may lead to mishap. This widening range of scenarios can exceed our planning, situational awareness, and imagination. One coping skill is to monitor for the feeling of wrongness. From Master Airline Pilot, page 210:
11.5 IDENTIFYING COMPLEX PROBLEMS
Now that we have examined some of the cases and strategies where complex problems are inappropriately treated like familiar, simple situations, we will focus on how to identify and solve complex problems. Consider the following list of characteristic that imply complexity.
- Something happens that is new to us.
- It feels important.
- It doesn’t match the current game plan.
- There are significant consequences if the wrong choice is made.
- It falls outside of what we expected to happen.
- It involves coordination with crewmembers or outside agencies.
- It presents unclear or uncertain outcomes.
- It adds more complexity to a situation.
11.5.1 Recognizing Wrongness
While this list seems wide-ranging, all of the points share one common characteristic – they describe events or characteristics that fall outside of our future SA prediction. Since they don’t match what we expect to see, they feel wrong. Remember that we continuously envision a story of how we expect the flight to unfold. This story is like a movie formed from our experience of how our game plan progressed in past flights and how we adjusted it to fit with conditions. If we were to freeze our aircraft like we can in a simulator, we could describe how we would expect the flight to progress from that point on. When we detect events that fall outside of our story, they feel wrong. We can classify wrongness in three categories.
- Small blips: We expect to see many subtle variations. They contain a small amount of wrongness. We either dismiss or correct them.
- Events requiring quick corrections: As we ratchet up the intensity of these variations, events start to clearly feel wrong. They still remain within the safety margin of our game plan, so they shouldn’t generate adverse consequences. We only need to make quick, corrective decisions to preserve our game plan.
- Significant events requiring reasoned decision making: Significant events feel very wrong. These events make us sit up and pay attention. Their complexity requires us to apply well-reasoned decision making. It feels like our current game plan is failing, so we need to modify or replace it.
As Master Class pilots, we value our ability to assess the level of wrongness within our situation. This sense arises from our subconscious as a feeling, not as a conscious thought. We know that a rising sense of wrongness often means that our game plan may no longer align with evolving conditions – that unknown conditions or interactions between conditions have degraded our situational awareness. We respond by changing our perspective to view our game plan more skeptically.
The hazard with pilots discounting or misjudging their felt sense of wrongness is that they tend to cling to their original game plan despite rising indications that it is failing (plan continuation bias). They increase the force necessary to push their familiar, but failing, game plan through to its conclusion.
Our Master Class response when detecting wrongness is to increase our vigilance for counterfactuals. This means that we need to assign similar weighting both to signs that our game plan is failing and to signs that our game plan is remaining valid.
Even after detecting wrongness, a common problem we see is pilots devoting too much time diagnosing their unfavorable trend or berating themselves for missing the rise of adverse conditions. This highlights another Master Class skill – assessing time available. If we have ample extra time or can make more time by altering our flight profile, then we can employ a deliberative, CRM-assisted, decision-making process. If not, and if the scenario continues to veer off from our expected trajectory, the safer course of action may be to abort the game plan, diagnose the conditions, and try again.
Our ability to sense wrongness evolves from both experience and of personal introspection. This improves our awareness of our feelings and our responses to them. After encountering a difficult event, we debrief ourselves and our crew.
- What was the first point on our event timeline when we sensed wrongness?
- What was our first, instinctive reaction to this wrongness?
- Did we assess time available before reacting or launching into deliberative decision making?
- Was our assessment of the level of wrongness accurate?
- Did we choose the best course of action (dismiss the sense of wrongness as trivial, make corrections to our game plan to accommodate the emerging conditions, or abort our game plan for a safer option)?
- What can we do to refine and calibrate our wrongness detector?
By repeatedly evaluating and refining our experience of wrongness, we develop the skills to manage the most appropriate response to rising complexity.
