Fix the System, Not the Symptom

May 20

It’s time to dig out the root, and stop just cutting back the weeds

If your company is like most companies, there are likely recurring problems that you’re tired of dealing with. Morale might be inconsistent. Performance could be better. People seem stressed and anxious. In all-hands, employees aren’t speaking up like they used to. You don’t feel like you’re innovating fast or well enough anymore. Overall, the vibe is just a little off.

And if you’re like most leaders, your tendency is to fix problems. But what if you’re fixing the wrong problems? When in dire straits, too many leaders focus on the fire directly in front of them. They try to fix the most immediate, acute symptom of the illness plaguing their company at that very moment. But just as you can’t cure a disease by treating one symptom alone, you also can’t fix your company by focusing on one issue at a time.

You have to go to the root of all the issues and fix the system itself.

In this article, we discuss how leaders can identify the root problems and start to fix the system, as well as, what it should look like when things improve.

1) Acknowledge that Problems Exist

The first step to figuring out any root causes behind a company’s poor performance is for the leader to acknowledge that there are problems to begin with. This may sound obvious, but a lot of leaders either aren’t willing to talk about failures, don’t know how to face them, or both, which only erodes trust further, making matters worse.

To make sure your company can survive a particularly rough patch, you have to be willing to face the music. Leaders who refuse to see and accept the truth teach their teams to lie to them. The boss refuses to hear what’s really going on, so I’m just going to stop telling them.

Often, just acknowledging that there is a problem (without casting blame) creates an opening for a constructive conversation.

2) Focus on Adaptive Problems, not Technical Ones

Now that you’ve acknowledged there even are problems, you want to figure out what they are so you can address them. But where do you look?

Most often, leaders will first look to fix the technical problems—things like processes, procedures, and tech tools. Problems for which there are known and proven solutions. For instance, they see that the sales team isn’t hitting their targets. So, they change the call scripts and hope that improves conversion rates. Very often, however, the problems at the root of your company’s issues are adaptive in nature, (a.k.a. systemic).

For example, the sales team isn’t having trouble meeting their targets because their call scripts are ineffective; they’re struggling because they don’t feel empowered to solve problems. Their managers are telling them what to do instead of asking them for their ideas, and they don’t feel comfortable speaking up, so they stop working effectively. These are the less obvious problems—lack of motivation, hampered psychological safety, too much micromanaging—that often underlie what we see and experience on the surface.

A rhetorical tool that is useful in this situation is the “Asking the Five Why’s.”

What’s going on? The sales team isn’t meeting its numbers.

Why? They aren’t motivated.

Why? They don’t feel trusted.

Why? They are closest to the customer but not invited to “Voice of the customer” conversations.

Why? The Head of Product doesn’t value their opinion.

3) Ask the Hard Questions and Invite the Hard Conversations

Once you’ve uncovered what’s really going on, the leadership team needs to get honest. Look at what’s not being said and open up some hard conversations. Consider each of these questions:

What are the important conversations we’re not having? Why?
What are the hard truths we’re unwilling to face?
In what ways are we not taking radical responsibility?

Next, get as much data about the issue as possible. Talk to other team members about the culture of their teams and the organization at large. Conduct anonymous surveys. Try to get as much unvarnished, unbiased information as you can about the team’s experience and how they feel at work every day.

Finally, involve the team in problem solving. Adaptive challenges almost always require a bottoms up approach to problem solving and solution development. Top-down processes are often met with resistance, suspicion, and ambivalence. By sourcing ideas from your team, including them in the problem-solving process, and gaining their buy-in for any new solution you are already doing the work to resolve many of the systemic issues mentioned above.

Notice that we said “Invite the Hard Conversations” in the subhead. That is categorically different from being open to a hard conversation. By inviting the conversation you are proactively making time and space for the conversation to happen and treating people like your valued guests.

4) Getting to Greener Pastures

You’ll know you are making progress when seemingly unrelated indicators start to improve: less turnover, more feedback from front line managers, improved morale, etc. These improvements will extend to bottom-line issues, too—stronger execution, teams hitting their targets, more creative products and solutions, etc.

Which ultimately equals better vibes and better outcomes all around. Once you get the positive flywheel spinning, momentum takes over.

Making it Stick

Fixing the system you have now won’t fix all problems in perpetuity. You’ll always have new problems to address, and you will see new symptoms come up as your organization matures. That’s why they call it the Infinite Game.

The goal, however, is to make sure the next problems you have are better, less disruptive, and less existential problems than the ones you have now. Having new, better problems means you finally dealt with your previous systemic ones. And over time, you will continue making micro-adjustments toward your organization’s ever-elusive flow state at scale.

Edward Sullivan