Business Problem Solving: Keep Asking Questions

If you are new to managing at work, you'll be facing many new tasks you never had

to think about before, and one of them is business problem solvingsolving your own problems and other people's problems.

If you are like thousands of other new managers, you'll make this even more of a challenge by thinking you have to come up with solutions to problems in the blink of an eye, every time. The fact is, that's not true. Some problems can be solved quickly, while others need more thought, consideration and even collaboration with others.

But nevertheless, when people come to us with problems at work, often we're too anxious to jump in with a solution that is, at best, temporary. There's an alternative that often results in a better solution, and that involves having a conversation with the person who has come to you with the problem, drilling down to find the root cause of the problem.

One method of doing this is called the "5 Why" method. Sometimes it takes fewer than five, sometimes more, but five seems to be a number that often brings results. The idea is to ask why the problem occurred, and keep asking why to each answer that comes up. Here's an example.

Bob reports that the sales report is late again. Why is it late?

Because the Eastern Division figures have not come in yet. Why?

Because Joe was traveling on business for a week and the figures had to wait for his return. Why?

Because nobody is responsible for doing this, or anything else, when Joe is away. Why?

Because nobody has been trained to fill in for Joe: Joe has no backup.

So it appears that this will continue to happen unless you deal with the root cause, which is Joe's lack of backup. So one solution would be to train one or more people for these tasks, and the figures should come in on time in future, whether Joe is there is not.

Now you might have simply accepted the excuse that Joe had been away, and agreed to wait an extra day for the figures. Perhaps a one-day delay is a short-term solution, but it won't do anything to stop the problem happening again.

Asking "why" to each partial solution until you find the root cause of the problem will let you put systems into place to stop future problems before they arise.

Now wasn't that worth a conversation?

by: Helen Wilkie

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