Build #40 - the two types of problems for growth businesses

Hey there,

As the New Year break becomes an increasingly distant memory, many founders will be looking at where they focus next.

Founders are natural problem solvers. Creating a business from nothing means spotting and solving problems, over and over again.

In my work, I often talk with founders about the distinction between problems to solve and problems to work on.

Problems to solve are the ones where you can identify and treat root causes. With focused analysis and decisive action in response, you can make changes and the problem goes away.

In contrast problems to work on are those where you’ll never reach a final resolution. They’re open-ended, wicked issues that lack clear root causes and perfect solutions.

When dealing with a problem to work on, rather than aiming for a permanent resolution, your goal is to apply sustained effort to continuously make incremental progress on the issue.

Things go awry when leaders mix up the two types of problems.

Treating a problem to work on like it can be solved for good just leads to wasted effort, often creating a load of undesirable unintended consequences for the business.

So how can you identify what type of problems you’re facing in 2025?

For more straightforward solvable problems, you’ll find the constraints, rules and parameters tend to be relatively stable and well-understood. Often the problem is confined to a single process, system or team.

There’ll be a lot that seems familiar. Teams will be able to reference previous experience and patterns from their prior work as they get to the bottom of what’s going on.

But if trying to map out the causes, effects and dependencies for a particular problem makes your head spin, it’s likely it’s a problem to work on rather than a solvable issue with cleaner boundaries.

Problems to work on tend to be highly complex, with many interrelated factors and stakeholders involved. They’re pretty resistant to linear cause-and-effect analysis. The terrain keeps continually shifting as new variables and unexpected obstacles emerge over time.

If it feels like the goalposts keep moving, it’s a strong signal that you’ve got a problem to work on. That’ll need sustained iterative effort rather than a one-and-done fix.

When I’m consulting with founders, I often ask about their company’s track record with the issue they’re facing.

I’m looking to see if they’ve already cycled through multiple “solutions” that might have given some short term relief before the issue resurfaced in a new way. That’s a classic sign of when the problem needs to be seen as one to work on rather than solve once and for all.

The other thing that I’m looking out for is when a problem starts off appearing solvable, but then reveals itself to be more wicked over time.

These can be the most insidious situation for a scaling business - founders deploy scarce time and attention on finding the elusive “solution” when in reality no such fix exists. Instead sustained management and re-evaluation is what’s truly required.

So as you set priorities for the start of 2025, make sure you think about the types of problems you’re solving before getting started.

And if you’d like to work with me to help with that, drop me a line and I’m always happy to help, however I can.

best regards,

-sw

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