I Teach Leaders to Solve Problems. Here's My 6-Step Framework
If you want to get good at growth, get good at fixing problems. Here's how to do it predictably and repeatedly.
As a strategic coach, I work with high-performance leadership teams to build growth roadmaps. Oftentimes, the companies double in just six to 12 months. These growth rates expose issues and cracks in the business that must be addressed quickly. Identifying these issues quickly and systematically solving them is key to successful and sustained growth. Having both a framework and experience using it will improve any business's prospects.
Here's mine:
1. Review and reflect
I start by carefully reviewing what happened. Collect as much data as possible on what led up to the situation and how things played out. It's key here to get perspectives and opinions from as many sources as possible. I like organizing things in timelines and swimlanes for different people, teams, and departments. Here, we stick to the facts and try to weed out inferences and assumptions.
2. Find critical issues
Once the situation is mapped out, we look for where issues occur. These could be errors, delays, rework, wasted resources, or unnecessary operational complexity. I have the team dig into these and find the most important issues. I like having them plot what they find using a matrix of likelihood and impact so we can focus on a few issues that are causing the most problems.
3. Define the problem
Once we have a handful of things to investigate, I have the team clearly define the problem, why it exists, and how it's causing it. Once everyone is clear and in agreement on this, I have them articulate three to five success criteria that, once met, would mean that we've solved the problem or improved the situation significantly and sufficiently.
4. Look for systemic causes
Once the problem is defined, we can start looking for underlying causes. I like using a fishbone or tree diagram to visually map these out. Each cause needs to be independent and clearly contribute to the problems. Avoid generalizations and edge cases. For example, don't just say increased shipping costs. Say 22 percent of shipments go out as partial orders, which has increased average costs by $1.24 per order.
5. Pull multiple threads
Once we have several options, we can start finding causes of those causes using the same logic. I call this iterative triangulation as we start broad and narrow down the factors as we go. Sometimes we might hit a dead end, and we need to crawl back up the process to investigate another path. Eventually, we'll find a few core issues that are really driving the problem.
6. Listen to your gut
Sometimes this can be a difficult process, and you'll find several factors. First, I suggest focusing on the factors you can actually do something about. Second, focus on those that can be addressed with clear changes to business systems and processes. Finally, I have people check in with their guts; when they get that sinking feeling when they hit an issue, it probably means it's the one to focus on.
Root cause analysis can be more of an art than a science at times, but being systematic and developing a repeatable process will help it not feel like witchcraft. Teams that do this again and again and get good at it can dramatically improve their learning cycle time and can out-deliver and innovate against competitors.
