Problem-Solving Success Tip: Use Your Time for Problems that are Truly ImportantLearn Management Articles on management-info.biz. Problem-Solving Success Tip: Use Your Time for Problems that are Truly Important article will help answer your questions on Management Articles.We at management-info.biz specialize in Management Articles. Management Articles at management-info.biz provides the most up to date news and articles. If you have questions please do not hesitate to contact us.
Hard as it may be to walk away once you're aware of it, just because a problem is there doesn't mean you have to solve it. Ask yourself and your colleagues, 'What will happen if we don't solve this problem?' If the answer is, 'not much,' then turn your attention to something more important. If you don't know what will happen, find out before you undertake a problem-solving project. It should be clear to you and everyone else involved that the problem is worth the effort--and expense--to fix it. Quantify the cost of the problem quickly, but as realistically as you can. Include lost opportunity costs as well as real expenses such as staff time to deal with the problem, travel expenses, etc. Use actual costs where you can; estimate where you can't. Then guesstimate what it will cost to analyze and fix it. Write your analysis down, stating all your assumptions explicitly. Get a colleague to verify that your assumptions and estimates are reasonable. Start with a rough 'order of magnitude' estimate. That may be enough to answer the question of whether you should proceed. If it's not clear, especially if the cost to solve it will be high, do a more careful analysis. If it will cost more to fix than to live with the problem, or if the number is even close, perhaps your resources (time, people, money) are better spent on other projects. If you decide to proceed anyway, you can do so with a better understanding of what you're undertaking. On the other hand, if you can demonstrate that the cost of the problem is much higher than the cost of solving it, using estimates based on reasonable assumptions, it will generally be much easier to get the resources you need. You can use your written analysis as a sales tool to help win support for your decision to proceed or not. We have to learn to distinguish those things that are truly important from those that are merely urgent. --Jerry D. Campbell
copyright 2005. Jeanne Sawyer. All Rights Reserved. |
More Articles:1. How to Build Your Business and Still Take Time Off By Hannah McNamara We all know people who are like human dynamos. They seem to make an art form of building their business and still enjoy quality time with friends and family. It isn’t magic, you can do it too.The world of business ownership or management is inhabited by two main personality types. There are people who never miss deadlines, who can be replied upon to deliver the goods whatever the odds and, who seem to thrive under pressure. Then there are people who achieve very little and yet seem to be perma… 2. Overthrowing eMail Tyranny By Sharon Teitelbaum Do you have a friendly relationship with email, or do you feel like a slave to your email?Do you get a sinking feeling every time you check your email because you know there are more new messages than you even want to know about, let alone read?Do you spend time reading “interesting” and “valuable” material that people have forwarded to you when you really should be doing other things?Do you check your mail several times a day and feel that every message requires your response within 4 hours?D… 3. Saying One Thing, Doing Another... By Colin Shaw This week I was asked to speak at an internal conference for a bank. The subject was how to build a great customer experience. However, the reality was somewhat different to the title. I sat listening to speaker after speaker - all coming along with the same message “how can we stuff more products into our clients and achieve our targets”.As I sat there I started to think, why do people say one thing and do another? Do they really think people are that stupid that they cannot see the conflict … 4. Rescuing Projects in Crisis A project is in serious trouble having overrun its budget, and deliveries are far behind schedule. The previous project manager has been fired, team morale is low, sponsors are hopping mad, and senior management is fuming. You are brought in to take over the project and turn it around. What should you do? Well, before getting into the thick of action, consider the following reasons why projects generally run into trouble: 1: Insufficient commitment from project sponsors. 2: Unclear requirements… |
||||
