What I don’t want you to do is to take months or even years, which tends to be our default timeline for solving hard problems – Anne Morris
Raise your hand…if you’ve read, or heard, the line that is attributed to Facebook (or sometimes Google), “Move fast and break things”. If you’ve been following Silicon Valley and the tech industry at all, you have probably read or heard this statement many times. It’s not necessarily wrong. It drives us to move faster than we think we can. However, for many of us outside of the tech world, we’re not sure how it applies to our business. Or, even if it might apply to our business, we’re not sure that it is the right approach at this point. Well, now you can consider some similar ideas that absolutely apply to your business: “Move fast and fix things!”
In their recent book, Move Fast and Fix Things, Frances X. Frei and Anne Morriss expounds upon the concept of moving fast and challenging all of us to start fixing things and improving our organizations…now. Not weeks or months from now. The structure of the book uses the five-day workweek to walk readers through a plan for addressing existing issues within their organization:
- Monday – Identify your problem(s)
- Tuesday – Create a “good-enough” plan
- Wednesday – Make new friends (employ diverse individuals and groups)
- Thursday – Tell a story
- Friday – Go fast
The reality is that most of our organizations have issues that warrant being addressed. Most of our organizations will spend far too much time pondering…considering…avoiding..and even ignoring the issues rather than confronting and addressing. That is, ultimately, what I got from this book. The need to start showing some sense of urgency. We must acknowledge the reality that many of our most challenging problems are costing us money and talent.
Frei and Morris do not merely challenge us to address our issues. They also challenge readers to understand their cultures and the shortfalls that affect business and employee satisfaction. Beyond traditional business challenges such as product development or customer engagement, the authors challenge readers to consider the cultural issues that may hinder progress on multiple fronts. If you’re looking to develop organizations that amaze customers and embrace internal partners (employees, vendors, etc.), then this book needs to be on your reading list.
Talk directly to the other people who have a stake in your problem. Sounds obvious, but you might be surprised to learn how infrequently people actually do it. – Anne Morris