My Five-Step Method for Turning Business Problems into Action
When a leader feels stuck, I use five steps: identify the problem, identify a solution, check it against the vision, create a plan with measurable outcomes and owners, and bring the team in for feedback. The purpose is to turn a vague concern into a decision people can act on.
You don’t need a complicated presentation to begin. You need an honest description of what is happening and enough curiosity to question your first explanation. Here is how I work through it, using a hypothetical business that keeps missing customer deadlines.
1. Identify the actual problem
“My team needs to communicate better” is too broad to guide a useful change. I would ask what happened, where it happened, and why. Then I would keep asking why until we have something more specific to investigate.
Perhaps the customer was promised a date before the delivery team checked its workload. Perhaps requests arrive through three different channels. Perhaps nobody owns the handoff. We should examine the process, training, capacity, and leadership expectations before deciding the cause is a person’s attitude.
For our example, a useful problem statement might be: “We confirm delivery dates before checking capacity, so the team receives commitments it cannot reliably meet.” Now there is something concrete to address.
2. Identify a practical solution
Ask what could change and what resources the change would require. Consider more than one option. Hiring another person, reducing the scope, and changing the intake process solve different problems; they should not be treated as interchangeable answers.
Our example business might test a shared capacity check before confirming a deadline. That is a specific response to the identified problem. It can be tried and evaluated without assuming a bigger team or a new software subscription is automatically the answer.
3. Check the solution against the vision
An efficient solution can still move the business in the wrong direction. Bring the choice back to the company’s purpose and the experience it wants to provide. Ask whether the solution supports the people you serve, the standards you value, and the kind of business you intend to build.
If the example business promises thoughtful, dependable service, accepting fewer rush requests may support that vision. Saying yes to every deadline might undermine it. The vision helps make that tradeoff visible.
4. Create a plan with outcomes, owners, and deadlines
Decide who owns the change, what they are authorized to do, when it begins, and how you will know whether it is helping. An owner needs more than their name beside a task. They need the information, time, and authority required to carry it out.
For example: the operations lead checks capacity before dates are confirmed, the team starts the process next Monday, and they review missed deadlines weekly for the next month. They record a starting baseline and agree on a realistic improvement target. These are sample planning choices, not a promise of results.
I often build a 90-day plan and then connect it to a six-month and one-year direction. The near-term work should be concrete enough to start while still serving the longer vision.
5. Bring the team in for feedback
The people doing the work can see problems a leader misses. Ask what is unclear, what could fail, and what support is missing. Have them explain the plan in their own words so you can check whether you share the same understanding.
Although this is the fifth step, listening should happen throughout the process. This final check helps turn an individual proposal into a plan the team understands and can carry. Revise it when their feedback exposes a gap.
Start with one problem
Write down one issue you keep revisiting. Work through the five steps and end with a named owner, a first action, and a review date. You don’t need to fix the whole business at once. You need a useful next move and a way to learn from it.
If you want help applying this method to your business, explore strategic planning with Empowerment Central. We can start with the problem that is taking up the most room in your head.
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