Success in Systems Engineering is most honestly measured in the problems that were avoided. As you can imagine, this causes no end of challenges. If you list the risks exhaustively and then effectively mitigate them all, your list can look overly cautionary or paranoid. 

There are dozens of articles written about how we laud the fire fighters and overlook the fire marshals who prevented more fires than the fighters ever fought. I’ve even written and spoken about this conundrum myself.

So you would think that I would be primed to recognize and appreciate the elements of my own life that avoided problems before they needed solving. Sadly, even I can fall into the trap of mistaking a successful precaution for an overreaction.

Case in point: outlet covers. Yes, I am talking about those infuriating little pieces of plastic that you stick in your outlets to prevent tiny little fingers or poky toys from finding their way into the sockets. 

When my son first showed signs of independent, directed movement, we went on a tear to baby proof the house. Covers on the corners of sharp furniture. Breakable things raised to ever higher shelves. And, yes, covers on every possible outlet.

Then he actually started moving and routinely bonked into those corner protectors or reached for the breakable objects just beyond his grasp. What he never did once was show the slightest interest in the outlets.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago when it became clear that we needed to baby proof once more. Because we have a 3.5 year old running around, the breakables were already as safe as they were going to be and we haven’t really tried to remove any of the edge or corner protectors. Setting cabinet locks aside for now, the primary remaining difference between this time and last time was the outlet covers.

We had grown to loathe those things. They are a pain to remove, even when you get the ones that are specifically designed to have a pull tab to make them easier to get out. Once out, they are loose choking hazards that must be tracked carefully until they can be put back in place. And, to rub salt in the annoyance wound, they protected something our son never cared about in the first place.

In case you haven’t yet figured out where this is going, we skipped the outlet covers this time around and (surprise!) the very first thing our daughter crawled to repeatedly was an old, ungrounded outlet with a shiny brass cover. After it became clear that this was not a one day phase, I sighed, went to the storage closet, pulled out the outlet covers and plugged one in.

She hasn’t even looked at the outlet since.

All that pain and annoyance with our son was not an unnecessary precaution. His total disinterest in the outlets was validation of the plan. Think about it from the baby’s perspective: An outlet is interesting! It has a pattern with holes! You could stick your fingers in it! Meanwhile, an outlet cover is boring. It’s a flat piece of plastic and nothing more.

Even after putting in that first outlet cover, it took almost a week before I was relating the story to another mom friend and had a forehead slapping moment of revelation. I was treating my outlet covers the way most people treat systems engineers and taking the lack of drama for granted. This article is my penance.

When I’m not writing odes to outlet covers, I work with my clients to build custom Operating Models and processes that iterate quickly and bypass the largest pitfalls instead of falling in and climbing out again – an increasingly valuable skillset as more companies start to integrate AI into their operations. If you own a business or lead an organization and are thinking that you could use a little less drama in your own professional life, let’s chat.