There is an important difference between getting unstuck and finding the answer.
Remember when you were solving word problems in high school algebra? Do you remember that feeling of being stuck? Going to the back of the textbook for the answer did not help you get unstuck. The goal of getting unstuck is to reorient your relationship to the problem, which makes it possible to find an answer.
Getting unstuck liberates us from our thinking traps and restores momentum. Fundamentally, getting unstuck means learning something new.
To get unstuck, we need one or more of the following
- New data,
- New perspectives
- New insights.
The Unstuck Minds Compass reorients your relationship to your most persistent challenges by equipping you with four strategies for recognizing potential thinking traps and loosening their grip. Taken together, the four strategies provide data, perspectives and insights that change the way you define the problem. A single question headlines each strategy of the Unstuck Minds Compass. Let’s use each question to work an example.
Imagine that you are part of an employee engagement task force sponsored by your organization’s Human Resources (HR) department. The team has concluded that one key to greater employee engagement is frequent, ongoing coaching conversations between direct reports and their managers. The task force has implemented several initiatives to encourage coaching conversations. After each program or training course, employee focus groups report sporadic improvement, but the improvements peter out within weeks. Meanwhile, the employee engagement scores haven’t improved. The task force has defined the problem as an inability to get managers to conduct regular coaching conversations with their employees. The team feels stuck.
The Four Questions of the Unstuck Minds Compass
- What is the bigger picture?
Contextual Inquiry encourages us to zoom out and consider what is changing in the environment that we haven’t paid enough attention to. Let’s say that by asking about the bigger picture, we learn that…
- Lower unemployment rates and aggressive recruiting are making it harder to retain our most talented employees
- The increasing importance of learning how to adapt to a volatile and complex business environment might mean that mastering tried-and-true practices has become a lower priority for leadership development
- What is causing our dissatisfaction with the current situation?
Critical Inquiry directs our attention toward the underlying and hidden systemic issues that might be responsible for the situation we want to change. Let’s say that by asking about the causes of our dissatisfaction, we learn that…
- Coaching in our organization is perceived as punitive rather than a way to build trust, rapport and capability
- Our managers don’t care as much about the employee engagement surveys as the leaders of our HR department do
- What needs and perspectives are we missing?
Collaborative Inquiry asks us to consider the influences of social networks and diverse life experiences on our challenge. Let’s say that by uncovering needs and seeking out diverse perspectives, we learn that…
- Millennials and their managers have misaligned priorities and values when it comes to performance expectations and career planning
- We discover that our highest potential, early career employees view their current role as the place they’ll learn the skills they need for their next role
- How else might we define our challenge?
Creative Inquiry challenges us to question our assumptions and consider alternative ways to frame our problems given the data, perspectives and insights we’ve gathered by responding to the first three questions.
Perhaps we have come to realize that focusing on changing the behavior of our managers may be part of the problem. We originally defined our challenge as, “How do we get our managers to conduct regular coaching conversations with their employees?” Maybe we should consider defining our challenge as, “How might we help our employees realize their potential?”
