Our leadership team is great at identifying tactical problems on our Issues List, but when we start IDSing, we waste hours discussing surface symptoms because people are afraid of the interpersonal conflict required to name the real issue behind the issue. How do we structure our IDS process to pierce through this politeness and get to the core friction?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Politeness is the enemy of progress. When teams avoid conflict during IDS®, they end up treating symptoms while the actual disease continues to rot their operations. To get to the issue behind the issue, you must master the Identify step before you even think about discussing or solving.

When an issue is raised, the person who brought it up must state the problem clearly in one sentence. Then, the team must ask clarifying questions to drill down to the root cause. This requires a high degree of vulnerability and trust. If the issue is labeled as a marketing tracking problem, but the real issue is that the sales manager is not entering data, you must have the courage to say so. Use the phrase: what is the real issue here?

Ask why multiple times. If a project is late, do not just accept that the developer was busy. Ask why they were busy. You might discover they were working on pet projects for the Visionary, which reveals a boundary issue on the Accountability Chart.

As the owner, you must actively encourage healthy conflict. Remind your team that calling out a problem is not a personal attack; it is an act of service to the company. If the room feels tense, that is usually a sign you are getting close to the truth. Do not back down. Keep digging until you have identified the real root cause, and only then move to the Discuss and Solve phases. If you do not solve the root cause, the same issue will reappear on your list next week.