How many times have you heard this from your managers, “don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions“? Or better still, how many times have you said it yourself? I know I have. Too many to even think about. But, until recently, what I didn’t realize up until only a short time ago, was that by saying it whenever someone came and talked to me about an issue, was that in effect, I was brushing them off. What I was really saying to them was that ‘only come to me with problems you can fix’.
Inadvertently IÂ was encouraging staff to turn a blind eye to problems they couldn’t figure out how to fix instead of encouraging accountability. In my mind, I was trying to silence the whining that goes on in offices by a select few. You know the ones-the ones that always see something wrong and all they do is whine about it. I always thought that it was better to encourage someone to see a problem and think of a solution instead of just focusing on the problem itself and not make it right.
Simply put, looking for a problem is a solo effort but looking for a solution can sometimes be a collective effort. Some problems need to be discussed from many different viewpoints to find a suitable solution. Sometimes the solution can be very complex and far beyond the capabilities of just one person. So by saying to someone, ‘don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions’, in effect you are saying to someone that you only want to know about the problems they can solve themselves. It’s basically a misguided intention that has been hanging around the management world for a long time. Probably because it kind of sounds empowering,”go out there and solve some problems, I trust you because you are a very intelligent person”.
In modern management, we need to find another way to deal with whining staff. One way to do that is to look at some companies that promote a culture of problem solving. And who better to look to than Toyota for some good management tips?. For them, it is said that problems are a good thing because it offers them opportunities to do things better. Along their production line they have what they call an ‘andon cord ‘. What it’s for is that if someone sees a problem on the line, they pull the cord and it gets the attention of a manager who looks into it immediately before the line goes any further. Just because they see a problem doesn’t mean they have to know the solution before they pull on that cord. They are rewarded or honored for doing so. No wonder Toyota outperforms many of its competitors on a consistent basis.
As a manager, you are responsible for creating a culture in your workplace and a culture of accountability is one that you want to strive for. If a person brings you a problem, instead of saying that well rehearsed brush off phrase (just in case you don’t remember, it goes “don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions“) praise the person for bringing it to your attention and perhaps ask them if they could suggest a way to fix it. Promoting that kind of response will encourage your staff to automatically think of ways to fix problems and if they can’t, tell them you will bring it up at the next staff meeting and find a collective solution. Part of your role in management is fixing problems and if you don’t know what they are, how can you fix them? The person who brings you the problem is just as much of the solution as the people who actually formulate a fix. Encourage it and reward it.
Posted in Management Articles For Managers | Tags: brush off, dont bring me problems, whiners, whining
