Solving Hard Problems

Many business problems have been solved. They may not have been solved by you, but the primary problems of manufacturing, inventory management, accounting, marketing, and project management have known solutions. I do not diminish the importance or hard work associated with execution!

There are challenges which can be met from first principles, but do not have recipes:

Innovation
Organizational culture
Developing people
Business model transformation

These require a combination of cross-functional disciplines, paying attention to the Muse for inspiration, and plain hard work. There are examples (not recipes) to study. Generally people who read about successful changes in one organization can’t precisely replicate that same change in their organization.

Lean into hard problems. There’s joy and satisfaction in the journey through them.