TOOL #9: ROOT CAUSES
Systems Question:
"What are the root causes?"
We often do not realize the impact we have on others. The relationship between different parts of a complex system are usually difficult to define, much less understand. In addition, decisions made in the past often impact results (or lack thereof) today. Thus, it helps to use free-flowing and participative management techniques to find linkages. These strategies reveal the multiple causality factors that are really the root causes.
Your actions each day have a long-term impact on others.
Principle:
—While Root Causes are usually not linked closely in time and space—their effects can be far reaching.
Our simplistic “cause and effect” analyses and desire for quick fixes often create more problems than they solve. Because our world (earth) is composed of seven levels of complex and interdependent living systems, multiple causes with multiple effects are our true reality.
For example, our local weather and crops are affected by the ocean, clouds, rain, wind, plants, and food (i.e., El Nino).
Delay time—the time between causes and their impacts—can have an enormous influence on a system. The concept of “delayed effect” is often missed in our impatient society. It is often too subtle, ignored, and almost always underestimated. When we feel that results aren’t happening quickly enough, it shakes our confidence, unnecessarily causing violent “knee-jerk” reactions.
Decisions often have long-term consequences years later. Mind mapping, fishbone diagrams, and all sorts of creativity and brainstorming tools can be used to project consequences.
However, keep in mind that an issue’s complexity often extends far beyond our human ability to fully assess and comprehend the consequences intuitively. For this reason, it is crucial to flag or anticipate obstacles, understand and appreciate them, and learn to work with them rather than against them. It takes a team effort, too!
Examples:
–If you are relatively new in your organization, do you know its history and why some things are the way they are? Ask around and learn them. Remember, “Things are the way they are because someone wanted them that way.”
–If someone makes a decision in your life that affects you but doesn’t make sense to you, ask the person the rationale for their decision. Then, ask them again, “Is there any other reason?” Ask it a third time to get at the real reason he/she have this view.
–When you are about to make a major decision in your life or your work, stop and “troubleshoot” the decision prior to implementing it. For example, ask who it might impact, positively or negatively. Then check with that person about it.
TOOL #9 SUMMARY:
1. Involve people affected by a change in the search for root causes and solutions.
2. To find the root causes, the training and development function has many active learning techniques.
3. Use these active learning techniques to search for root causes vs. “surface symptoms.” Some root causes are very hard to find.
4. Continually ask, “What else might be the root causes?”
5. Keep an open systems view of the environment, as it often contributes to the overall root causes.
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