There are times you don’t heed your own advice, which is generally inadvisable. My mother, who is widowed and lives alone, complained to me that she needed a to replace her landline phone. She said it was old and had stopped recording messages, so someone needed to set her up with a new phone. She sounded agitated, so I jumped into action. I bought her the new handsets, and my husband installed them the same day. Mission accomplished.
I promptly texted my sisters to let them know I’d replaced our mother’s problematic phone. We take turns helping her out, so I was feeling pretty good about doing my part. My oldest sister responded, “Are you sure she needed a new phone? I noticed that she often forgets to clear out the answering system, so when it’s full, people are unable to leave messages.”
“Oh.”
At that moment I realized I’d done two things I know never to do; I jumped to a solution, and I assumed technology was the answer. I had done zero investigation to figure out what was truly hampering my mother. I threw money (and my husband’s effort) at what I assumed was the problem, and I still had to deal with the real problem, my mother’s issues with clearing her inbox.
The Problem with Solutions
I felt like a dope, although I’m glad it happened since it made me sympathetic to the people I mentor. I probably spend a decent portion of my coaching efforts challenging proposed solutions when team leads don’t yet have a clear sense of the problem. In fact, many of their so-called “problem statements” start with, “The problem is the lack of [insert solution here].” In those cases, I start by asking, “what would that solution solve?” to get some clarity on the issue.
Once the problem grows less hazy, I have to stay the course when they jump from the problem directly to the solution. My mother gave a classic example, “the phone won’t record messages, so I need a new phone.” I was blinded by my sense of daughterly duty yet failed to ask, “do you know why it’s not recording messages?” Honestly, she’s ninety-years-old and discussing technology is her idea of a bad dream. In contrast, most of the people I coach are fluent in technology—which means automation is often the go-to solution. That’s an entirely different can of worms.
Why Do We Jump to Solutions?
Solving problems is fun. If we asked a neuroscientist, I’d suspect they’d reveal that coming up with solutions is associated with a dopamine hit. It’s feels good. When a problem comes up, it’s natural to start considering solutions. And yet, I’ve heard countless stories from people describing the unintended consequences of knee-jerk solutions. Most didn’t solve the problem, sometimes they made things worse, and they generally wasted people’s time and resources.
Don’t Bring Me a Problem, Bring Me a Solution
There’s another reason we forgo analysis. We may have been conditioned to make a beeline from problems straight to solutions. Many of us had managers with catch phrases like, “don’t bring me a problem, bring me a solution.” It sounds like good advice. Solutions are better than problems, right?
The idea is to stay productive by skipping directly into solution mode. The downside, when you’re encouraged to jump directly into a solution, is that the likelihood of digging to the true root cause starts to dwindle. Another disadvantage is the lingering stigma around acknowledging problems. That mindset short-circuits any effort to address what needs attention. That’s a risky road to go down.
Toxic Positivity
I heard this term recently regarding organizations that exclusively advocate celebrating wins and forward progress. Those are great things to reward, but not at the expense of surfacing issues. There must be a balance of encouraging people to keep problems visible while celebrating accomplishments. Otherwise, we remain blind to what’s holding us back.
The Easy Path
Driving to the store to get the latest phone required a trip to town and it cost money, yet it was something I knew how to do. Heading over to my mother’s house to replace the phones took time, but my husband also knew what he was doing. In contrast, trying to figure out why she wasn’t getting messages could have been messy. I would have had to do some experimenting to see what the issue was. Or talk to people (like my sister) to see what they thought was happening.
There’s a great expression in the continuous improvement community that encourages people to “use creativity before cash.” That saying was born of situations like mine. It might seem more expedient to throw money at an issue. Purchasing technology or hiring people are familiar tasks. Another acronym that captures the preference for throwing money at something is OPM, pronounced “opium”, which stands for “Other People’s Money.” Once we’re part of a large organization, the barriers to resources can be low.
Choosing the Road Less Traveled Combine all these factors, and it’s clear we need to beware of the Jello-instant-pudding approach to improvement. Take a pause and ask a few questions. What makes us so sure we’re going to solve the problem? Have we done our homework? Have we gone down the road of asking “why?” That path is not as clear. It’s got forks, dead ends, and potholes—yet the results are less costly, and … they’ve got a better chance of working out.
