Creative Problem-Finding

Executives are trained to solve problems. Very few are trained to find them. Yet the most valuable work a CEO does is often deciding which question the organisation should be answering in the first place.

Creative Problem-Finding means treating the presented problem as a hypothesis. Falling margins may be a pricing problem, a cost problem, or a sign that the customer has quietly moved on. Each framing leads to a different company. The leader who reframes early saves the organisation from executing brilliantly on the wrong thing.

Disruption is where this capability earns its keep. The same shift that threatens a business model usually opens another one. Seeing it requires time away from the operating rhythm and people around the table who are allowed to ask the naive question.

• The same problems return every year under new names.
• Projects deliver on time and still do not move the business.
• Meetings jump to solutions in the first ten minutes.
• Nobody on the team is rewarded for asking the awkward question.