In business, we will be brought in to clean up someone else’s mess and to be effective and achieve success will be the point person to take ownership of providing solutions to problems or messes we did not create. How do we clean up messes effectively?
- Identify the real problems and possible solutions? This may require a causation vs correlation analysis and dig into finding the true cause of the problem we are trying to solve. Peel away emotion and deal with the facts. Politics operates in the realm of correlation, problem solving operates in the world of causation
- What did the prior person/team do that caused the problem?
- Talk to owners/employees to ask for clarity as to pain points they feel need to be addressed?
- Review the solutions the prior individual/team provided and provide new solutions and new alignments (vendors/consultants)
- Be patient and don’t move too quickly. This can cause for a decrease in morale and people to become unnerved
- Documents the problem and map out the solution process
- Always be encouraging the team
- Never criticize the prior team
