Page 417 - Ray Dalio - Principles

3. If the outcome is bad, is the Responsible Party incapable and/or is the
design bad?

If you keep those big questions in mind and anchor back to
them, you should do well. What follows is a guide for getting

the answers to these big-picture questions, mostly using a
series of simple either/or questions to help you get to the
synthesis you are looking for at each step. You should think of
these as the answers you need before moving to the next step,
leading all the way to the final diagnosis.

You can, but don’t need to, follow these questions or this
format exactly. Depending on your circumstances, you may be

able to move through these questions quickly or you may need
to ask some different, more granular questions.

Is the outcome good or bad? And who is responsible for the
outcome? If you can’t quickly get in sync that the outcome
was bad and who specifically was responsible, you’re
probably already headed for the weeds (in other words, into a
discussion of tiny, irrelevant details).

If the outcome is bad, is the RP incapable and/or is the design bad? The goal

is to come to this synthesis, though to get there you may need
to examine how the machine worked in this instance and build
the synthesis from there.

How should the machine have worked? You may have a mental map
of who should have done what, or you may need to fill it in
using other people’s mental maps. In any case, you need to
learn who was responsible for doing what and what the

principles say about how things should’ve gone. Keep it
simple! At this stage, a common pitfall is to delve into a
granular examination of procedural details rather than stay at
the level of the machine (the level of who was responsible for
doing what). You should be able to crystallize your mental

map in just a few statements, each connected to a specific
person. If you are delving into details here, you are probably
off track. Once you’ve established the mental map the key
question is:

Did the machine work as it should have? Yes or no.