ARTISTIC MANAGEMENT

Some times, these answers do work.

However, in most of the cases, they don not. What do we do next?

We try our best to find even "better" answers.

How often do we consider the option that probably we were not asking the right questions?

How often do we even think that the act of searching for the right questions deserves some attention and some extra effort on its own?

Whenever required to find a solution to a problem—any problem—we always start with the questions we already have, and try to find better and better solutions to those questions.

Instead, what needs to be done is to spend that effort in finding better and better questions. Once we stumble upon the right questions, finding the answer, as Einstein remarked, is only 9% of the effort.

Isn't it shocking to realize that we spend near-zero effort in what should constitute 91% of the total effort?

Simple—once you do so—the solutions start to emerge as an "obvious" outcome.

In the next newsletter, we will look at how the right questions can be used to bring out the best of your team.

XYZ? Do ABC??

The quality of any solution to a problem depends on the depth of the problem that has been delved too.

Imagine a doctor who prescribes a medicine for each symptom.

That is precisly what a lot of managers do.

"Project delayed? Work in the weekends."

"People leaving? Don't let them have enough access to the opportunities outside".

"XYZ? Do ABC".

Such approaches are as stupid and dangerous as the doctor who would go about prescribing a medicine for each symptom that he observes.

For sure, these approaches are as unproductive as well.

The Japanese corporations are famous for their "Nimawashi sessions". These are meetings which do not end in conclusions, which do not have action items, and no set of final recommendations. None of the team members feel the need to provide an answer in these meetings. These meetings are conducted just for the purpose of fully understanding the context of the situation.

The problem at hand is done to death from several perspectives, the situation just appraised better and better. Only once they have slaughtered the problem situation deep enough, they venture to start creating the solutions.

To Westerners, they look like frivolous, unproductive sessions.

For the Japanese, these sessions are the critical foundation of assuring well-implemented, creative solutions.

"I worry about techno-freaks who would tell us that if we simply get the right organizational design and apply the right information technology tools, all will be well. There's a wonderful one-liner that I use in my seminars which says, "Information is the enemy of intelligence."