Know the problem before you solve it
Not every problem is the same kind of problem. This free framework helps you name what you're actually dealing with — so you match the right method to it the first time, instead of throwing a plan at something that won't sit still.
Most of the time, effort isn’t wasted because people picked the wrong solution. It’s wasted because they never stopped to ask what kind of problem they were solving.
A routine task gets treated like a research project. A genuinely uncertain bet gets a detailed, up-front plan that reality refuses to honour. A crisis gets a committee. The method feels reasonable in isolation — it’s just aimed at the wrong kind of problem.
This is the framework we use on every engagement, and the one we’d hand a client on day one. It’s built on Dave Snowden’s Cynefin model, stripped back to something you can actually use: name the problem first, then match the right method to it.
What’s inside
- The four kinds of problem — Simple, Complicated, Complex and Chaotic — and how to tell them apart
- Why matching the wrong method to a problem is the most common, and most expensive, mistake
- A one-page decision flow for classifying any problem in the moment
- The two errors that cost the most — over-planning the Complex, and under-analysing the Complicated
- How mature teams push problems “down the ladder” so the same work gets cheaper over time
14-page guide · 10-minute read · Based on the Cynefin framework
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