Stop Optimizing the Mess

If it feels like you’re constantly fixing the same problems, you probably are.

by Janet Ply, PhD · The Practical Leadership Newsletter · January 20, 2026

The issue isn’t effort or competence - it’s that you’re trying to solve symptoms, not the problem that keeps creating them.

Are You Fixing a Problem or a Symptom?

Most problems don’t show up where they start. They show up where the pain points are most visible.

That’s why capable leaders often spend time working on symptoms while honestly believing they’re doing the right work.

When errors pile up, customers complain, or work slows down, attention goes straight to what’s visible. Exceptions. Rework. Missed deadlines. Angry emails. I’ve been there, done that.

It feels like the responsible thing to do. It feels urgent. Yet, it’s often misdirected.

Downstream pain is noisy. Root causes are not.

Symptoms announce themselves. They interrupt meetings. They show up in metrics. They trigger escalation emails.

Root causes are often upstream, quietly injecting defects into the system day after day.

If you’re always busy “fixing,” there’s a good chance what you're working on is fixing symptoms instead of the real issue.

Why Smart Leaders Chase the Wrong Problems

This isn’t incompetence. It’s proximity. We work where the pain is most visible. The people yelling the loudest usually aren’t the ones creating the problem - they’re the who are being affected the most by the inefficiencies.  

Technology vendors don’t help here either. Symptoms are easy to sell against. Root causes are harder to market. What vendor, during a sales cycle, admits their products can’t fix something?

So, leaders optimize cleanup instead of prevention, and call it progress. They are busy being busy.

When Fixing the Mess Becomes the Job

When I work with leaders, I often see the same thing repeating.

A team is buried in errors, rework (or both), so they build better exception handling. More checks. More escalation paths. More heroics. Teams become good at looking like heroes and in reality, they're just propagating the issues.

Unfortunately, the problem is that saving the day becomes status quo.

Why “Let’s Buy a New System” Usually Fails

I can give you more examples than I can count of the mindset where a leader thinks the problem can be fixed with new technology. 

One client team processed sales commissions and was buried in errors and exceptions. Their solution? They needed a new system. The real issue was there was no single source of truth for hundreds of compensation plans. Different versions in different locations, many requiring calls to sales managers to sort the issues out... one at at time.

Another client in mortgage operations blamed the operations department for underwriting delays. Ops wanted new software. The root cause was loan officers submitting incomplete applications. Sometimes you have to slow down to go fast.  

Speeding up a broken process with another software system just helps you fail faster while frustrating teams and the business with changes that still don’t help and burn through money needlessly.

People, Process, Technology - In That Order

Mature organizations know the sequence:

People → Process → Technology.

Many leaders reverse it. Technology feels tangible, decisive. It looks like action is being taken. It comes with demos and timelines and promises of fixed problems.

But if the process is broken, or ownership is unclear, new technology platforms become expensive and useless projects.

So, what can we do to right this wrong thinking?

Five Steps to Diagnose the Real Problem

Before solving anything, slow down and make sure you understand what the problem really is.

Step 1. Trace the work end-to-end.
Where does it start? Where does it break most often? Is there a documented process flow, complete with quality gates and structured handoffs?

Step 2. Ask where defects are introduced.
Are problems created early and discovered late?

Step 3. Confirm ownership.
Is there one person accountable for the process, end-to-end? If not, how are handoffs to different departments made so that the next team gets what they are expecting?

Step 4. Examine the inputs.
Is the data standardized? Is there a single source of truth? Or is the data spread across multiple systems with varying degrees of accuracy and completeness?

Step 5. Delay technology decisions.
If you don’t have a clear process to follow with the right people in place, you aren’t ready to make technology changes.

One Thing You Can Do Now

This week, pick one recurring pain your team complains about.

Ask yourself:
“If we fixed the earliest cause of this, what downstream work would disappear entirely?”

Then spend 30 minutes walking the process with the people who touch it first, not the ones stuck cleaning it up.

The best leaders don’t just solve problems. They make problems stop recurring.

Want More Tips Like This?

If this resonated, you’ll appreciate my latest book, Practical Leadership: A Guide for Building Trust, Getting Results, and Changing Lives. It offers practical tools, frameworks, and processes for the real situations leaders face every day.

Dr. Marshall Goldsmith, Thinkers50 #1 executive coach and New York Times -bestselling author of The Earned Life, Triggers, and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There“ has this to say about the book:

“Janet Ply has created what so many leadership books promise but rarely deliver- a practical and actionable guide, grounded in real-world experience. With clarity and compassion, she cuts through the noise and gives leaders exactly what they need: a framework that works in the messiness of real organizations. Whether you’re new to leadership or trying to rebuild your confidence after years in the trenches, this book will equip you to lead with greater trust, accountability, and purpose. It’s not just theory - it’s a road map for real transformation.” 

You can order it here.

The AI Prompt Portal for Leaders Is Here!

I’ve developed an AI Prompts Portal for Leaders to support the concepts in Practical Leadership. It provides detailed prompts, needed context, and is trained on the frameworks in the book so leaders can use AI as a thinking partner to solve problems.  

The prompts address situations such as:

• How do I prepare for a difficult conversation?
• How do I deliver executive presentations with the right information and tone?
• How do I set a project up to be successful from the start?
• What do I need to delegate so I can scale?
• How do I build a business case requesting additional resources?
• How do I build trust with my team?
• What tactics can I use to increase my self-awareness and management?
• What should my 30-60-90 day plan be for a new leadership role?
• And much more

The AI Prompt Portal for Leaders is a comprehensive toolkit that accompanies my Practical Leadership Workshops.

If you’re interested in using AI as part of my workshops to build leadership skills and competencies faster, schedule time with me at janetply.me.