Today’s Strategic Alignment Journal post in two sentences:
When something stops producing the result we expect, our instinct is often to start fixing. Before deciding what needs to change, it may be more useful to identify what changed first.
When anything stops working, our attention usually goes straight to the problem.
- Revenue is down.
- A project is late.
- Customers are complaining.
- A team that once worked well is struggling.
The temptation is to ask: How do we fix this?
A more useful question to ask, may come just before that one: What changed?
Perhaps the people changed. The workload increased. A process that worked at one scale no longer works at another. Expectations shifted. A supplier changed. A new policy was introduced. Or several small changes accumulated until the system began producing a different result.
We can spend a great deal of time trying to repair the present without understanding how we got there in the first place.
Looking for what changed gives us a point of comparison. It helps us separate what has always been true from what is different now, and gives us a stronger basis for deciding where attention needs to be.
Strategic Reflection Prompt
Think about something in your organization that is no longer producing the result you expect. Write down what was different when it worked better, then list what has changed since, including changes in people, process, workload, resources, expectations, timing or circumstances.
Now look at the list and ask: Which changes happened before the result began to shift? These are the places inviting a closer look before you run off in search of a fix.
About Giselle
Some of the most costly decisions begin with a wrong read of the situation.
I’m Giselle Hudson, The Pre-Fixer™. I am asked to intervene when something important needs to be better understood before a consequential decision is made.
As The Pre-Fixer™, I act as a strategic thinking partner, working with leaders to examine what they are seeing, separate what they know from what they may be assuming, consider what else might explain the situation, and surface what may not yet be visible.
I don’t fix; I pre-fix. My work happens before the solution is chosen, helping leaders build the understanding from which better decisions can be made.
Through my daily Strategic Alignment Journal, I explore leadership, decision-making, business and the patterns that shape organizations, following the questions and observations that help us understand situations more clearly before deciding how to respond.
What are you trying to make sense of right now?
