Welcome to the first issue of Failsafe's new NETLETTER. Each time I issue this Netletter, I'll do my best to bring you something you can use in addition to announcing upcoming events.

Most importantly, at least for me, I'm going to try to use this netletter to VENT about whatever has been on my "root cause" mind. Venting is good. It stimulates thought and discussion. In fact, I hope you vent BACK to me. In future issues of this newsletter, I might even include some of your comments, unless you tell me not to. THANKS!

For quite some time, I've been convinced that we all struggle with the same things -- ALL of us, wherever we live and wherever we work. We all seem to know this -- it's almost a cliche. But if we dwell on the fact that we all struggle with the same things, some profound discoveries can be made.

One of these discoveries relates to our "home problems." Most of the problems I have at home are the same ones YOU have at home. More importantly, the CAUSES of my home problems are also the causes of YOUR home problems.

Admittedly. I've been forced into looking at my home problems. You see, although I've worked in industry for the first 15 years of my career, it's been 20 additional years since I've been employed in one of your companies. In order to be an effective RCA consultant, I depend on three things to keep me current. First, I investigate on site incidents when requested. Secondly, I teach many RCA classes per year, all around the world, attended by real people like you. Lastly, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, I am a husband, father, and homeowner -- something that I share with just about everyone.

Focusing, therefore, on my personal problems, I've tried to be as honest with myself as possible when answering the question "Why do things go wrong within my household?" I've found that it's the UNRESOLVED SMALL PROBLEMS that eventually cause big ones! It's not the one-off, single-occurrance small problems that are the source of the big problems in my home-life -- it's those that I do not act-upon -- those that remain UNRESOLVED!

I've learned, mainly through contact with so many of you in the seminars I teach, that most of you have unresolved small problems AT HOME just like me -- small problems that eventually cause big ones. I've also learned, mainly through investigating BIG problems in your companies, that it's the unresolved small problems AT WORK that cause big problems AT WORK. I find this fascinating -- the same thing that causes problems at home also causes problems at work!

Why do we allow small problems to exist? Listen to some of the answers I've heard -- both from myself AND others!

We have too many big problems to worry about the small ones.

There's no way I can act on all my small problems -- there's too many of them!

It's unrealistic to think that we can resolve all our small problems. Get real!

Could it be that the above attitudes are responsible for most of our problems? If so, is there any hope? IS IT possible to resolve all the small problems that reveal themselves to us?

If this subject interests you, please consider downloading the "full story," a 170 KB paper (with photos) that is the basis for a presentation being made at the upcoming International Maintenance Conference in December (Florida).

Whereas other approaches will help you change your physical and management SYSTEMS, we'll go one step further: We will help you change your PEOPLE. After all, we (the way we think about things) are the real root causes of our failures.