This presentation will explore the normalization of deviance in health care from a variety of perspectives such as: Why is the concept important? Why do deviations occur? How might they be identified? How can they be managed? Who should lead the effort and how? Very importantly, health care personnel are often aware of colleagues who are not following rules, protocols, standards of care and the like, but they do not call attention to them or they might do so informally but, often, ineffectually. Consequently, most scholars on this topic underscore the prominence of leadership in curtailing “negative deviance” and in identifying and championing “positive deviance.” This session will end with a series of suggestions as to how to turn informal operational knowledge into something constructive and positive such that it can become an instrumentality for patient safety.