THE EFFECTIVE PROBLEMSOLVER #110
I’ve spent most of my career focused on problem-solving.
I even named this newsletter after it.
To me, problem-solving is the missing ingredient in much of the social sector—a place too often filled with virtue signaling and initiatives that sound good but don’t actually change much.
Still, I’ve learned the hard way that seeing everything as a problem can backfire.
The instinct to fix things can be a blessing and a curse.
Take my own home life.
Like many parents, I’ve tried to help my teen keep their room clean. I’ve bargained, reasoned, even offered incentives. But they don’t see the mess as a problem. To them, it’s just how life is.
The more I tried to solve “the problem,” the more it became my problem—not theirs.
Eventually, I realized the only way for them to learn was to let the natural consequences unfold: a lost shirt, a missed deadline, the frustration of living in clutter.
That lesson—about what is and isn’t truly a problem—applies far beyond parenting.
It’s also at the heart of systems change work.
The Illusion of Other People’s Problems
In social change, we often try to solve problems other people don’t think they have.
We assume our analysis, our logic, or our moral urgency will bring others along.
It rarely works.
Imagine a neighborhood where people complain about “urban blight.”
Old apartment buildings are deteriorating, the paint is peeling, and the lawns are patchy.
City leaders step in with an “affordable housing” initiative, demolishing the older buildings to make way for new ones.
The problem?
Those old buildings were the affordable housing.
The new units—though labeled “affordable”—cost $600,000 or more to build per unit, as in many California projects. High zoning and construction costs make it nearly impossible to build anything inexpensive.
So the real problem isn’t that we aren’t building enough affordable housing—it’s that we’ve created a structure where every unit costs too much to build.
When we focus on symptoms (old buildings, visible blight) instead of structures (zoning, financing, regulations), we often make things worse.
We’ve solved the wrong problem.
Structure Determines Behavior
I’ve seen the same dynamic play out over 20 years in Minnesota.
Leaders talk about collaboration, then design systems that make collaboration nearly impossible.
Each organization has its own funding streams, accountability measures, and performance metrics.
The structure rewards competition and control, not cooperation.
And yet, every few years, someone launches another “collaborative initiative” as if the lack of teamwork were a moral failing rather than a structural one.
The system behaves exactly as it’s designed to behave.
If we want different results, we have to redesign the structure—not just tell people to act differently.
The Wisdom of Letting Consequences Teach
There’s a deep wisdom in cause and effect—both in personal life and in systems work.
Natural consequences, when allowed to play out, are often the best teachers.
In our rush to help, we sometimes protect people—or entire organizations—from the feedback they need to grow.
We bail out failing programs, shield partners from accountability, or try to “fix” behaviors that only experience can correct.
Of course, this doesn’t mean we abandon people to suffering.
It means we respect the learning process.
Change often comes not from someone else’s intervention, but from the friction between choices and outcomes.
If we treat every discomfort as a problem to be solved, we rob people—and systems—of the chance to evolve.
When to Step Back
I still catch myself jumping too quickly to fix things.
It’s part of who I am.
But the longer I do this work, the more I realize that wisdom in social change often comes from restraint—knowing when to step in, and when to step back.
Not everything is a problem.
Sometimes, it’s just life doing the teaching.
See you in two weeks.
-Bryan
