Last week, I made a visit to the dentist, following a painful episode when biting into a carrot stick (of all things). The sudden, sharp pain, on the right side of my mouth, was intense. I immediately decided on two things: i) only chew food on the left side of my mouth for the foreseeable future and ii) schedule an appointment with my dentist at the earliest opportunity. Little did I know that a trip to the dentist would offer insights into the art of problem-solving, or more specifically problem definition.
Read on to find out why….
Leaders within organizations are perpetually confronted with challenging issues that can generate discomfort and pain, perhaps not unlike a painful toothache.
Picture the scene. You’re in a meeting with an important client who recently transitioned their payments business to your company. You’re eager to nurture the relationship, and the meeting proceeds smoothly. Just as your concluding, the client raises one last concern about a number of payments that were delayed recently, causing headaches for their customer service unit and by extension for their underlying customers.
You apologize to the client and agree to get to the bottom of it immediately. You call your trusted Head of Operations, who promptly assembles a team to resolve the problem. Procedural changes are soon implemented, employees receive additional training and a dedicated queue is established for the client’s payments to expedite the resolution process.
All seems well at first, the client expresses satisfaction with your efforts. But a few weeks later, a different set of clients raises concerns about a decline in service levels which could trigger another round of problem-solving for your organization.
Until, that is, you and your operations lead have a realization moment – we have the right solution to the wrong problem.
The true problem isn’t the speed at which the client’s payments are being processed, it’s the fact that they are falling to repair in the first place. Focusing your staff on fixing the repair speed issue inadvertently diverted resources away from servicing other clients and causing potentially costly dissatisfaction to those clients instead.
Getting back to the dentist’s chair.
As the seat reclined, I described my problem to the dentist. She was polite, acknowledged the issue but didn’t immediately offer an explanation. Instead, she conducted a methodical examination of my gums, mouth and teeth, asked me a series of questions like “Have you had any recent mouth injuries?” or “Have you eaten any hard foods like ice or hard sweets and heard a cracking noise?” and only after the examination was complete and I confirmed in the negative that I had not had that experience – did she offer her diagnosis: I have a fractured tooth.
The pivotal lesson from my dental encounter is that the problem we initially perceive or sense is often not the actual or real problem, its merely a symptom.
A systematic process is needed to uncover the real issue behind that which can be distilled into four key steps:
- Step Back and Assess:
My dentist didn’t rush to conclusions; she invested the time in a comprehensive examination of my mouth and teeth to explore potential causes. - Formulate Hypotheses:
She considered various possibilities and hypotheses, envisioning potential variations in the problem and its underlying causes. - Ask Questions:
Armed with her observations and hypotheses, she then asked relevant questions and a few basic tests to rule out possible causes and validate her diagnosis. - Reframe the Problem:
She redefined the problem in clear, simple terms and presented me with options to address it. In the context of a delayed payment issue, it might mean shifting focus from addressing the delay itself to determining actions required for a seamless, straight-through payment process.
So, if you have a pressing problem in your organisation, why not consider taking a page from the dentist’s playbook and adopt the four-step approach outlined above. By doing so, you could increase your chances of solving the right problem and generate a higher ROI from your problem solving actions as a result.