Why Providing Solutions Might Be Making Things Worse (and What to Consider Instead)

When people tell us they are encountering a problem with someone else, a natural human instinct is to try and help by offering up solutions. This is particularly true for leaders who often face conflict situations brought to them by team members, feeling compelled to find answers. While the desire to be helpful is understandable, there are some key things to keep in mind about the drawbacks of providing solutions:?

1. Playing Solution Tennis: This occurs when every suggestion you make is lobbed back to you because the other person doesn’t believe it will work. You might end up exhausting your ideas, leaving both of you feeling frustrated and stuck.
2. Solutions Misaligned with the Other Person’s Needs: Even if a solution worked for you, it may not fit the circumstances or the personal style of the person dealing with the problem. We are all different, and what seems like a perfect fix for one person may not resonate with another.
3. Disempowering the Other Person: By jumping in with solutions, you might unintentionally take away the other person’s opportunity to think creatively or learn problem-solving skills. This can lead to a dependency on you for future issues, which is unsustainable and unhelpful in the long run.
4. Overlooking Underlying Issues: Offering quick solutions may address surface-level symptoms but miss deeper, underlying causes of the conflict. Without fully understanding the root problem, any solution may only provide temporary relief.

?A Better Way to Offer Solutions

If you still feel compelled to offer up solutions, here are some constructive ways to approach it:

Share Your Experience with a Disclaimer: If you have had a similar experience, share your solution but frame it as a possibility rather than a definitive answer. For example, say, “This is what happened to me and what worked for me, but it might not work for you.” This way, you provide a helpful perspective while acknowledging their unique situation.

Admit When You Don’t Have an Answer: If you haven’t faced this problem before, it’s perfectly okay to be honest and say so without scrambling to provide a solution. Sometimes, the most powerful support is simply listening and showing you care.

Work Jointly on a Solution: Collaborate with the other person by asking insightful, open-ended questions that help them to build their awareness and promotes self-determination. Neuroscience shows that solutions developed this way tend to be more sustainable and impactful for the person involved. Here are some questions that can guide this process:

• “What have you already tried, and how did it work out?”
• “What do you think is the real challenge here?”
• “What would a good outcome look like for you?”
• “What’s one small step you could take to move forward?”
• “How can I best support you as you work through this?”

By engaging with curiosity and empowering the other person to generate their own insights, you foster a stronger sense of ownership and confidence in their problem-solving abilities.