Hello everyone, Stuart here. In our latest PCE blog, I’m talking about the problem with problems. I’d welcome your thoughts and experiences of effective and not so effective Problem-solving, so please join the debate. I hope you enjoy this article.

If you know me, you’ll know I’m passionate about problem solving in the workplace.

I see all sorts of problems and encounter all sorts of problem-solving methodologies. But I also see some barriers to effective Problem-solving. The most common ones are; –

  • Lack of good process
  • Poor investigation
  • Acting on ‘gut feel’ and instinct
  • Teams pressured to ‘just get it fixed’
  • Fixing a direct cause, not the root cause

Let me give you my thoughts on our approach here at People Centred Excellence.

Firstly, apologies for my Lean Thinking bias (purely because problem solving in Lean, for me is essential. Problems should be solved at the lowest possible layers of the organisation, by coaching team members to become great problem solvers)

So, let’s look at the model, you will see, three elements in play, Complexity, Risk (to the business) and ‘time to fix’. I’m sure you will agree, these are three important factors to consider.

I’ll begin with the JDI’s (the Just Do Its). A Short time to fix, low complexity and low risk. From my experience, these are the things that cause frustration and overburden to our teams. Silly little issues that need a few minutes to an hour of focus to resolve. For example, installing a label printer at the workstation, saving the member a 200m round trip to the office. Ask yourselves, do we put enough focus on fixing these things? do we encourage creative solutions from our employees, do we give them time and support to implement fixes?

Next comes the 3C, more complex, say up to one week, and more risk if we don’t address the problem. These are things that need leader support. For example, an issue with a recipe, that requires rectification and rework in a food process. Here, we begin to need support that may be outside the immediate work groups control. Firstly, we need to define the concern, (maybe add a containment to protect the next process or the customer) then using the team’s expertise, gather possible causes. Investigate those causes and develop a countermeasure plan. Don’t forget to monitor the implementation of the plan and confirm its effectiveness.

The third level of problem solving now involves a wider team, hence Team Orientated Problem Solving. A much higher level of complexity, a lot more risk and up to say, 12 weeks to address root cause. (including a period of monitoring that problem is resolved) This takes the form of a 12 step (you may have variations in the number of steps) but principally, it involves breaking down a ‘large vague’ problem, by using a problem solving funnel to drill down into detail. For example, addressing over runs on a construction project (where multiple factors can contribute to the problem) 

The key to these activities is to gather a team of those with expert knowledge (that complement the skills of team members) Follow the process diligently, define the problem well and use data to guide your thinking approach. It’s also vital to combine the leadership principal of ‘genchi gembutsu’, go-look-see, at the real place where the problem is happening. Use your team’s expertise to gather possible direct causes, an Ishikawa diagram is perfect for this, then, drill down to root cause(s) and eliminate them through implementation of a robust countermeasure plan.

Select the correct tool for your problem-solving activities and the joy of solving problems will be readily apparent. Your teams will develop a ‘thinking way’ freeing up Leaders time, reducing firefighting and creating time for you to lead with purpose.

Please remember, the Leader’s role is to ‘Coach not Fix’.

If you need some useful templates to help you develop your teams Problem-solving capabilities drop us a note via our Contact page
https://peoplecentredexcellence.co.uk/contact/

Put ‘Problem-solving Templates’, or something similar in the Subject field and we’ll send some stuff to you. We might send you the occasional update on our upcoming activities in return for the free stuff (but nothing too frequent, we promise!).

Good luck and stay lean!

Stuart