Just Because You Must Does Not Mean You Can

There are a number of assignments we receive where we either have never performed such activities before or maybe we simply don’t know where to start. There are a number of ways to approach this dilemma, and many are better than the way we currently manage this situation today.

How do we manage it currently? We don’t want to admit that we don’t know, so we slog through using buzzwords that, in the best case, have different meanings for each individual. Worse case? It’s the linguistic version of the emperor wearing no clothes. Everyone is thinking secretly the words have no meaning, but nobody wants to publicly admit this.

Is it a crime to admit we don’t know how to do something? Within the corporate world, it is often seen as a sign of weakness. This is unfortunately based upon the fact that a number of individuals are geared towards honing into the vulnerabilities of others to foster their own profile. For this reason, the fear of failure culture within the enterprise becomes virtually impossible to shake off. Just like the linear model, the zero-sum game is a lose-lose proposition. This does not stop the sways of employees from following this path.

We don’t like admitting we have open questions. This is another perceived sign of weakness and is a point I have difficulty in fathoming. On it’s most basic level, we have open items and closed items. The open items are inherent questions tied to disparate levels of complexity. The question is another way of showing we don’t know. How can transparency flourish if openness is curtailed?

Another impediment we have is tied to the transactional way of thinking we have been conditioned with. 

Problem -> Solution

Problem -> Solution

Problem -> Solution 

By thinking in this fashion, we inherently negate the complexity of the issue at hand. Simplify the complicated, and we have disguised the matter. Instead of addressing what we can do, we select a solution and fudge a path of action throughout. 

How do we get past this malaise? We can start by being open with ourselves in categorizing what we know and what we don’t. The sooner we can clarify the unknown, the sooner we can make progress. Let’s make this visual. 

• Start off by creating a list of all the items tied to the subject at hand. Time your activity, and it would be quite useful to get others to participate as well. Best practice? I suggest keeping this exercise to about 3 minutes with the option to add items afterward. 
• Now, let’s dissect what’s been written down. Put the content into two categories; doable and difficult to do. The doable column should give you clear action items, which you can start working on right away. 
• What about the difficult to do column? Why are they so difficult? Could the items be too big? Can we break them down into smaller pieces? The goal is to move as many items to the doable column as possible. Can the problem be tied to a lack of understanding?
• Contrition is the first step toward redemption. Admit you don’t know, and start becoming knowledgeable. Once you start making the unknowable knowable, you will find out that that there are items you can move towards that doable column. Just by thinking about getting things done gives me a vicarious warm and fuzzy feeling.

This approach is not a magic wand. You will still need to perform the work, and often enough you will make erroneous assumptions. The fact is that a systematic approach will provide you with clarity, which is very often our largest mental bottleneck. I believe we can do much more than we think we can. What’s missing very often is a systematic approach.

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