Its all In Your Eyesight
In most workplaces, the fire alarms are metaphorical: deadlines missed, meetings filled with passive-aggressive eye rolls, Slack messages that sound like smoke signals. Leaders rush in with solutions—throwing tools, trainings, or incentives at the chaos. But here’s the hard truth: you can’t fix what you haven’t accurately assessed.
It’s not laziness. It’s misdiagnosis.
Take the case of a product team that keeps slipping deadlines. Leadership blames lack of motivation. So, they offer bonuses and motivational pep talks. But the real issue? The product roadmap is a spaghetti mess of conflicting priorities and stakeholder pressure. It’s not a motivation issue—it’s a clarity issue.
Channel Your Inner Neo
Remember The Matrix? Neo doesn’t defeat the system until he sees it. Morpheus offers him the red pill—not to fix things, but to see them clearly.
Same goes for leadership. Before you solve the problem, you have to “see the matrix” of your current reality. What are the unspoken assumptions? The systemic patterns? The power dynamics?
Practical Assessment Moves
- Map the Terrain: Start with interviews, surveys, or even shadowing team members. Ask: “What’s working? What’s not? What’s unspoken?”
- Visualize the Flow: Use a simple process map or task tracker. Where’s the work getting jammed? Where’s the ambiguity?
- Name the Elephant: That thing nobody wants to say? Say it. Kindly. Directly. Leadership starts with naming what others won’t.
When you get the situation clear—objectively, openly, and without judgment—you’ve already started the breakthrough.
Because clarity isn’t just power. It’s permission to do something different.
