Error proofing sliding glass door to prevent being locked out on balcony (again)

The dogs locked us out on the balcony of a 14th floor apartment.

Let me explain what happened and how we error-proofed it.

My wife does pet sitting, and we have been watching these 2 dogs for a few days at a time over the past few months.

The balcony of the apartment has a nice view of the river, so we sat out there to enjoy the weather.

We don’t let the dogs on the balcony (that’s another story).

So we closed the balcony door behind us.

The dogs scratched at the door, wanting to come out.

Then we heard a “click” sound.

They had pulled down the lock switch accidentally, and we were locked out!

See attached photos. Up is unlocked, down is locked.

Luckily, we had our phones and we called security.

They sent up maintenance who could get into the apartment and let us out.

Yikes, that could have been bad, especially if we didn’t have our phones.

We initially thought we could no longer be out on the balcony together again. That would have been frustrating…

Unfortunately, this is how many businesses solve problems.

• Warnings and threats to supervisors and workers to “never do that again”
• Extra inspection and approvals
• Limiting access to only “qualified” people
• Taking away tools and equipment that are useful

All these “solutions” do is make people fearful, add waste and delays to the work from getting completed, overwhelm those that haven’t made that mistake yet, and treat people like children.

Instead of discovering another option based on root cause analysis and brainstorming of error-proofing ideas.

So we kept thinking…

How could we prevent this while still enjoying the balcony together?

• Lock the dogs in the room? Maybe, but they’ll probably start barking.
• Take the risk of letting the dogs on the balcony? Not our dogs, too dangerous in our opinion.
• Change or modify the lock system? Too expensive and not our apartment.
• Add a broom or chair in front of the door? Maybe, but a lot of extra steps.
• Leave the door partially open? Nope, the dogs wedge it open.
• Train the dogs to push up on the lock? Didn’t seem possible or reliable.

I tested one more idea. Locking the door first, then shutting the sliding door.

It worked. It stays shut so they can’t wedge it open, but it doesn’t actually lock the door.

A simple error-proofing solution.

It just took a little extra time and creativity to figure it out.