Welcome to Friday 411, issue #139. In 4 minutes, with 1 insight and 1 action, you’ll reduce the confusion, fear, discouragement, and hopelessness that comes from leadership.
1 Insight
When you can diagnose a root issue, you can eliminate the symptoms.
I (Garland) vowed to stop using WebMD several years ago.
If you’ve ever used one of those medical diagnostic websites, you know how this goes. You type in your symptoms. Stuffy nose. Headache. Low energy. You just want to know what to do so you can feel better.
Instead, the site tells you it could be:
- A cold
- A sinus infection
- The flu
- Or an incurable rare genetic condition that gives you less than one month to live
Wait… what?!
I started with a little congestion, and now I need to update my last will and testament.
The treatment was no clearer. Maybe I needed a sinus rinse and some Mucinex. Or maybe I needed to book a flight to the Mayo Clinic to extend my life by three weeks.
It created way too much confusion.
And that confusion created fear, discouragement, and even hopelessness.
Here’s what’s wild.
Dorothy and I experienced the exact same emotions early in our leadership careers — not because of WebMD, but because of leadership advice.
We would start noticing symptoms. Our team wasn’t getting the results we needed. We were working too many hours. Conflict kept surfacing and wouldn’t resolve. We weren’t making progress on the goals we had set for the year. The symptoms were obvious, but the cause was not.
So we did what most driven leaders do. We went looking for answers.
We’d Google the problem and find 1,500,000 options. We’d go to Amazon and narrow it down to 750 books. We’d walk into Barnes & Noble and stare at 20 management titles, each one promising clarity. Then we’d attend conferences and hear speaker after speaker who sounded confident, compelling, and completely certain that their solution was THE solution.
We would buy the books, try the systems, implement the habits, adjust the goals, tweak the calendar, restructure the team, and still feel stuck.
And somewhere in the middle of all that effort, we began to quietly wonder if maybe we just weren’t cut out for leadership.
That’s the part leaders rarely admit.
You’re smart. You care deeply about people. You work hard. You take ownership. And yet something still isn’t working the way you hoped it would.
Your team underperforms. Your best people leave. You feel like you can’t get ahead no matter how many hours you work. You fix one problem and another one pops up. It becomes hard to tell whether you’re actually making progress or just staying busy.
So you start asking bigger questions. Is it because I didn’t “start with why?” Do I need better habits? A stronger culture? A different communication style? A new time management system? Is it strategy, structure, talent, accountability?
The options multiply. The advice conflicts. The clarity fades.
And when clarity fades, confusion grows. And just like with WebMD, confusion leads to fear, fear turns into discouragement, and discouragement quickly becomes a quiet hopelessness.
We saw this pattern so often — in ourselves and in thousands of leaders — that we began asking different questions.
- What if leadership problems aren’t infinite?
- What if most of the issues we face aren’t random, but rooted?
In medicine, doctors look past symptoms to identify the underlying condition. We believed leadership should work the same way. Instead of endlessly treating surface-level problems, what if we could identify the few root causes driving most of the frustration leaders experience?
After years of working with leaders in hundreds of organizations, we discovered something both simple and profound.
There are only seven root issues that cause 95% of company problems: Character, Competence, Capacity, Clarity, Community, Culture, and Consistency.
At first glance, that list may look basic. Almost too simple. But each issue goes incredibly deep. Each one shows up in predictable ways. And each one has practical, specific solutions once you correctly identify it.
This was the breakthrough for us.
If you can name the real issue holding you back, you can treat it. If you misdiagnose the issue, you will keep applying the wrong solution and wondering why nothing changes.
If it’s Competence, no new productivity app will fix it. If it’s Clarity, more effort won’t solve it. If it’s Character, better strategy won’t rescue you. The issue has to be named before you can address it.
That realization changed everything for us, and it has changed everything for leaders we work with. When you move from guessing to diagnosing, leadership stops feeling chaotic and starts feeling manageable.
That’s why we’re hosting a free, one-hour webinar on Tuesday, March 3 at 1:00 PM ET called:
“The 7 Leadership Issues Causing 95% of Company Problems”
During this session, we will walk you through all seven root issues, help you understand how each one shows up inside teams and organizations, and show you what to do once you identify the one affecting you most.
If you are tired of guessing, tired of trying random solutions, tired of quietly wondering whether you’re missing something obvious, this webinar will give you clarity.
You don’t need another leadership hack. You need an accurate diagnosis.
Join us on March 3 at 1:00 PM ET.
REGISTER FOR THE FREE TRAINING – March 3 at 1:00 PM ET]
Bring your questions. Bring other leaders you work with. Bring the symptoms you’ve been wrestling with. And walk away with less confusion and better clarity.
1 Action
Register for the March 3 webinar and block your calendar now. Progress begins the moment you decide to pursue the right diagnosis.