12 minutes
Where handoffs drop people Learn the four recurring failure points in a handoff, and the specific repair for each.
What you’ll be able to do Name the four common handoff failures and state the repair for each in terms a receiving office could act on. Compare the responses to this question and explain your choice: Where does the repair belong? Document a next step for Where handoffs drop people: Choose one handoff you are part of and define, in writing, who owns the gap and what confirms arrival. The interval nobody owns Most handoff failures are not errors. Each office does its part correctly and the person still falls through, because the interval between the parts belongs to no one. The sending office's responsibility ends at sending. The receiving office's begins at receiving. Between those two points there is a space, and people disappear into it without any record of having done so.
This is a design property, not a performance problem, which is why it is not fixed by asking staff to try harder. It is fixed by naming an owner for the interval and defining what ends it.
Four failure points and their repairs Nobody owns the gap The receiver does not know The person is not told what to expect Nobody checks whether it landed
What happens: The referral is sent and the person is between systems. Neither office has a task open. Time passes with no one accountable for it.
Repair: Name a role that holds the person until arrival is confirmed. One name, written down, with a defined end to their responsibility.
What happens: The referral arrives in a queue, an inbox or a fax tray that is checked on an uncertain rhythm. No person has been assigned. The referral is not lost; it is simply unaddressed.
Repair: Require acknowledgement within a stated window, and treat a missing acknowledgement as an event someone acts on rather than a silence.
What happens: The person leaves the conversation without knowing who will contact them, from what number, within what time, or what to do if nothing comes. An unexpected call from an unknown number goes unanswered.
Repair: Tell the person the name of the service, the likely caller, the window, and one number they can call if the window passes. Put it in writing in whatever form they can use.
What happens: The absence of a complaint is treated as success. People who fall out rarely complain; they are the least likely to have the capacity to.
Repair: Make the check a scheduled task rather than a courtesy. A short call at a fixed interval finds more than any report will.
A handoff is complete when the receiving service has made contact with the person, not when the sending service has sent something.
Make silence an event What you can change You control whether a missing acknowledgement generates a task or generates nothing. Most systems are built so that silence is the cheapest possible outcome.
What to watch for Do not rely on the person to report that nothing happened. The people least able to do that are the ones this most often happens to.
Your next step Pick one handoff and set a date by which a missing confirmation becomes somebody's task.
Carry this forward A handoff fails at four predictable points: nobody owns the gap, the receiving office does not know it is receiving, the person is not told what to expect, and no one checks whether it landed.
Ownership of the gap is the single highest-value repair, because it converts a silence into somebody's work.
A handoff is complete when the receiving service has confirmed contact, not when the sending service has sent something.
A tabs walk through the four failure points, a scenario decision and a knowledge check.
Choose one handoff you are part of and define, in writing, who owns the gap and what confirms arrival.
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