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Accessible practical diagnostic

The Long Work System Health Diagnostic

Rate each statement based on what is consistently true, not what is intended or occasionally possible. This is a reflection tool, not an employee survey or performance score.

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Rating scale

  1. 1 Rarely true
  2. 2 Sometimes true
  3. 3 Mixed
  4. 4 Usually true
  5. 5 Consistently true

Trust

People can surface reality without protecting themselves first.

01People raise concerns early, before a problem becomes difficult to contain.
02Disagreement can occur without retaliation, withdrawal, or loss of standing.
03Leaders explain consequential decisions honestly, including what remains uncertain.
04Commitments are reliable enough that people do not need private workarounds.

Clarity

People understand the work, the standard, and where authority sits.

05Priorities remain understandable when urgent demands begin to compete.
06Roles and decision rights are clear enough to prevent avoidable hesitation.
07Standards are specific, consistent, and applied across people and situations.
08People know what good work looks like and how it will be assessed.

Accountability

Responsibility is carried without blame, rescue, or avoidance.

09Performance concerns are addressed directly and within a reasonable time.
10People can own mistakes without being defined by them.
11Leaders follow through when expectations or boundaries are not met.
12Accountability includes support and consequence without confusing the two.

Healthy dependency

Support builds capability rather than permanent reliance.

13Knowledge and authority are distributed beyond a few indispensable people.
14Leaders resist solving work that appropriately belongs to someone else.
15People receive enough support to learn without being protected from all difficulty.
16The team can continue functioning when a key person is absent.

Repair

Strain and failure become workable instead of remaining underground.

17Broken commitments are acknowledged rather than quietly normalized.
18Difficult conversations lead to changed behaviour, not only temporary relief.
19The team can examine failure without collapsing into blame or defensiveness.
20Trust is rebuilt through visible follow-through after disruption.

Endurance

The system can sustain performance without consuming its people.

21Workload and staffing risks are discussed before exhaustion becomes failure.
22The team protects the practices and maintenance that prevent future crises.
23Short-term results are not routinely purchased with long-term fragility.
24Capability is growing in people who can carry the work into the future.

Your pattern

Transfer each subtotal. Resist the urge to focus only on the lowest number. Look for relationships between conditions.

Choose the long work

Do not turn the diagnostic into six simultaneous improvement projects. Choose the condition where deliberate work would create the greatest useful change.

Name the condition and the evidence that makes it important now.

Describe the behaviour the present condition rewards, permits, or makes necessary.

Choose one practice, conversation, boundary, or decision that can be made visible.

Bring it into the room

Use these questions to move from diagnosis toward shared responsibility.