Are you trying to solve top down or bottom up problems. By top down I mean the leader is solving a problem with the person in a position under them. An example might be, a sales team member isn’t hitting their daily sales goal. That’s the leader’s problem because they are responsible for the organizations revenue goal. The leader may decide to put pressure on the sales team member to get better results.
Bottom up means the person responsible for “doing the work” has an issue. That issue prevents them from doing a good job, enjoying their job, or being as awesome as they could be. They bring that issue to the leader and the leader helps them solve their problem.
What I observe is solving problems from the top down too much. People at the top are there because they are smart, good at solving problems, and make wise decisions. Hopefully that’s the reason!
But at the top you lose touch with the day to day experience of those “Doing the work”. You start to solve problems that are problems for you and not for your people. You begin to burden them with projects they don’t understand. Before you know it your business blows up and you’re screwed.
Just kidding… kinda.
How do we fix this?
The 6 foot rule. I learned this from a mentor yesterday. The person who is 6 feet from the problem knows the solution better than anyone else. Let’s use the same example from above. You have a sales team mate who isn’t hitting the goal. Who is closest to the problem? That SAME sales team mate. Go to him, present the problem and get feedback. He lacks training, motivation, or natural skill. Maybe there is a problem with the sales process, system, or there are issues with your product or service. You won’t solve those issues by seeing a number or goal that isn’t hit. You solve that by getting to the person 6 feet from the problem and helping him solve his issue!
Dakota Beerman 
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