Problem Solving to Problem Prevention – 3 Crucial Steps

The traditional problem solving techniques rely largely on data pertaining to the historical occurrence of problems. Which means the problems need to occur in order to be solved. The next gen, ‘Industry 4.0’ will have no room to allow the problems to happen to be solved. In the age of unforgiving competition, the ability to prevent problems and speed of innovation will define the competitiveness of business. The popular management techniques and skills enabling people to solve problems will need to be rested. Newer skills will have to be acquired to enable Problem Prevention. Here are some steps that need to be taken to institutionalize Problem Prevention:

1.      Understand latent needs of the customer

Asking customers for their needs (through interviews, surveys, etc) is already a thing of past in many industries. Empathy is the new source of information. It does not happen through dialogue or observation, it happens best by ‘being’ the customer and recording the emotions through the engagement lifecycle. Empathy coupled with scientific techniques helps us in preempting and simulating the problem causing situations, which in turn helps prevent problems. As we move from the space of stated needs to that of latent ones, the type of data that we get becomes more and more subjective. Modern, intelligent software that give a fair estimate of customers’ emotional state in different situations, could be of help.

2.      Understand your non-living customers

Our output is input for a process. This applies specially to the organizations with institutional customers. The Value (service, data, product etc.) that we produce passes through the process of the customer, gets transformed and is passed on to the next customer’s process till it reaches the end consumer. We often treat people as our customers and seek their inputs while designing our product / service. While people can voice their known requirements, processes can’t. The requirements of a process can be thoroughly discovered only through diligent observation. Careful observation of our customers’ processes can give us valuable ideas about simplification of entire Value Stream. The Value should ideally flow smoothly across the boundaries of organizations. This would not only reduce the overall cost but also prevent potential problems due to incompatibility issues in certain scenarios.

Therefore, processes (and related machines, software, etc) must be added to the list of our customers

3.      Redefine heroism

People’s behavior is largely controlled by the way their performance is judged and rewarded. The cumulative behavior of the people defines the culture of the organization.

Often, employees who spend time away from their place of normal work to mitigate effects of a problem in the field are treated as heroes. Sure, their extra efforts and time spent away of home coupled with good intentions deserve appreciation. The problem happens when managers treat such field problems as a norm and their resolution, a way to earn recognition. Many managers hire armies of heroes with prime responsibility of dousing the fire in the field. Immediate success of these ‘fire fighters’ encourages the management to continue to invest in them. A bulk of the budget is therefore consumed by fire fighting. Scientific analysis of problems and efforts towards preventing them get deprioritized. This limits the research capability, lowers the morale, adds to wasteful expenditure and most importantly weakens the customers’ trust.

In order to be future ready, ways to encourage the problem prevention and innovation over the traditional problem solving, need to be institutionalized. The earlier this change is initiated better would be the future readiness.

4.      Decentralize and accelerate innovation

The organizations that innovate with speed will be the ones to survive. Continuous innovation will help prevent problems and help a business sustain its competitive edge. Innovation needs to come out of the confinements of closed offices and R&D centers to each and every employee of the organization. Research suggests that most innovative ideas do not occur to the R&D professionals but to the people who are closest to the customer. It is important to provide employees enough platforms to voice their ideas and have a mechanism to capture and transform those into better services and products. It is important for the managements of future to provide environment conducive to innovative thinking.  

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