A Writer Writes!

I have a favorite movie. It is a dark comedy starring Billy Crystal, who plays Larry, a bitter and frustrated would be author, teaching creative writing at the local community college. The movie is a hilarious dark comedy, but that's not the point of this post! At the end of each class session portrayed in the film, Larry finishes his class session by stating to his students, "A writer writes!"

I am currently in the process of studying a book. I say studying because at first I just read it. The book is entitled, "How To Run Seminars & Workshops," (Robert L. Jolles, Wiley, ISBN 0471715875). There is a section on writing, which states, "Planning to write is not writing. Thinking about writing is not writing. Talking about writing is not writing. Researching to write, outlining to write - none of this is writing. Writing is writing."

So now I have two paragraphs in this post about writing. Why, one might suppose, is that? Well here it is: You can execute an Investigation. You can do it using Fault Tree Analysis or some other methodology. You can identify Root Cause and the appropriate Actions to mitigate the Loss Event and prevent it's recurrence. You can involve SMEs and your Investigative Team members. At the end of the day, you will have to document your findings. For many people, this is sometimes the worst possible aspect of an investigation, made more so when the summary requires approval from various parties, each of whom has their own opinion as to style and grammer, and which can reject your summary for tawdry edits that often don't make sense.

There are a million reasons why we don't like to write. However, at the end of the day, if we do not write at one point or another, the investigation is incomplete. In order to truly complete the investigation, it needs to be "wrapped up in a bow," through documenting (read as "writing") the investigation.

Lead Investigators, or at least a member of the Investigative Team, is typically a writer. And the Root Cause Analysis, must be documented and summarized so a record exists for review in the future. If for nothing else, to enable prevention of the same issues in the future. You may not feel like your documentation is up to par, and perhaps it is not. At least not now. But the more you write, the better you get at writing.

Over the course of a 26 month period, I documented 115 Investigations, all requiring full Root Cause Analysis. Many suggest that I am an expert. However, I contend, if that is the case, it is only through the continued practice that took place from writing so many investigative summaries in so short a period of time. Anyone can develop this skill set if they have a mind to. It's not difficult, although you have to toughen up your hide and accept feedback from time to time. But this is no problem if you truly wish to excel. The key thing to remember is...

A writer writes!