What’s your problem?
I recently had to take a friend to an urgent care facility in town after she broke out in hives and itchy skin, likely an allergic reaction to a food item. After making it into the exam room, the medical technician very efficiently completed the vitals and reconciled medication and past illness history. Next in was a physician’s assistant, who performed a quick assessment and confirmed our suspicions about the food allergy.
But what food? We still weren’t sure, even as the hives were quickly spreading and my friend agreed to a Benadryl shot. Within 20 minutes, the itching was gone with the hives almost disappeared. One crisis averted, one very drowsy friend.
I have prescribed and given Benadryl shots to my patients in the past but this was the first time as a non-physician that I noticed how quickly the drug acts and makes the reaction disappear. It got me thinking about how a lot of the countermeasures many organizations implement to solve a problem act like Benadryl. Symptoms disappear but the root cause remains.
Most people, in fact, aren’t sure what problem they’re trying to solve. For example, if sales go down, marketing goes up. But what if your products are defective? What if customers are getting the wrong product or are waiting too long to receive it? What if a competitor is turning out a better, faster alternative?
You will only be treating the symptoms if you don’t know the:
- actual problem you are trying to solve
- root cause of the problem
There are many tools available to get to the root cause of the problem such as the 5Whys and Fishbone diagram. I recently learned from a colleague a new method, causal mapping, which I prefer because it is visual and loose in structures, allowing for a free flow of ideas until you find the root cause.
My friend, by the way, is on her way to an allergist to nail down the real culprit.
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