Definition
A READ-DO checklist is performed during the work itself, recipe-fashion. The team — or a designated reader — reads each step aloud and the responsible operator performs it before the next step is read. It is the form Daniel Boorman at Boeing uses for emergencies and unfamiliar procedures, where ordering and exact wording matter more than verification.
The contrast is with DO-CONFIRM, which is run after the work is done and only verifies. READ-DO is for the moments when the work itself is unfamiliar, urgent, or order-critical enough that performing from memory is unsafe.
Why it matters
How it works
The 1989 United 811 cargo-door procedure that Boorman walks Gawande through is a READ-DO. When the DOOR FWD CARGO warning light fires, the pilot pulls the seven-line list and does each item in order: set landing-altitude selector to 8,000 feet; descend to the lowest safe altitude or 8,000, whichever is higher; place the air outflow switches on manual; push them in for thirty seconds. Each step depends on the previous one having been performed; reading-then-doing is the structural guarantee.
In other domains, READ-DO is the right form for incident-response runbooks (the cause is unknown, the team needs steps), for one-off operational procedures (database failover, certificate rotation), and for high-risk procedures performed by individuals who do them rarely (the surgeon's first attempt at a new technique, accompanied by the assistant reading the steps aloud).