Why do so many systems go so hopelessly awry in the first place that they need some near-miraculous fix to survive?
Imagine this scenario:
A person goes for a heart check-up. The results reveal elevated sugar, blood pressure, and cholesterol numbers. Instead of prescribing lifestyle changes and medication if required, the doctor says ‘your numbers are all elevated but I don’t really enjoy prescribing medications. What I really enjoy is surgery. So go back and when you suffer a heart attack and are lucky enough to make it to the hospital, I will be waiting to perform heart surgery on you. That’s what really gets me going, fixing things when they get really bad.’
It sounds ludicrous.
But it is exactly how many governments, corporations, organizations, and people (including you and me) function in certain aspects of our lives.
When a new leader or captain or head of state takes over, they inherit one of two things:
a) A broken system that needs to be fixed
b) A reasonably good or great system that can be bettered upon
Of the two, fixing something seems more glamorous. Fixing something paints an image of things being hopeless, broken, beyond hope, and then a superhero comes along and infuses new energy and brings everything up from the ashes. This ‘I want to be a superhero’ syndrome causes some to see things worse than they actually are in order to make themselves feel more important.
Sure, some cultures, ways of working, approaches and policies are truly broken and need fixing.
But this poses an important question — why do so many systems go so hopelessly awry in the first place that they need some near-miraculous fix to survive?
Very few things get broken overnight. Unless it’s some sort of a major catastrophe like a natural calamity that causes something to fall apart physically, many systems and cultures are self-fulfilling prophecies — things fall apart slowly because no one bothered to fix the problem when it was still manageable.
The only problem with constantly fixing things is that it leaves you with very little time to build something new. Fixing entails putting things together, instilling new and better systems and policies, charting a new course and stopping the hemorrhaging. Once that is done, the building can begin.
For instance, if a coach inherits a team where there was always a distinction between seniors and juniors and they want to change that culture, it is something that needs to be fixed before they can head in a better direction.
If a leader inherits an organization where everyone has been taught how to do things the wrong way by the previous leader or management, they first need to set that right before making any headway.
The problem with a broken system is very simply this — you can’t build upon it. A lot of time is spent bandaging it and trying to make it some sort of a functioning entity.
Every day, you are either encountering systems that are broken and need fixing or one that can be improved upon. Many systems are broken and laid to waste by market forces, technological changes and culture. That doesn’t mean making something better is pointless as it might become irrelevant tomorrow. Many systems we encounter today are a result of things that have been made better over time.
This also works on a personal level — are you learning/creating something that can be built upon tomorrow or is it something you or someone else needs to fix at some point?
