Have you ever seen someone struggling with a problem and immediately known how to fix it?

 

You can see the root cause. You know the countermeasure. You’ve probably solved this exact problem ten times before.

 

So you jump in with the answer.

 

And somehow…they don’t use it. They push back. Or they keep bringing you problems instead of learning to solve them themselves.

 

Sound familiar?

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In this episode of Thoughts on Change, we’re exploring Quickshift, one of the Resistobots™ that can get in the way of our effectiveness as Continuous Improvement practitioners and change leaders.

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Because sometimes, our ability to solve problems becomes a problem of its own.

 

What You’ll Learn

In this episode, I explore:

• Why being good at problem-solving can make it harder to resist the urge to fix everything

• How your automatic response to someone else's struggle might be more about your discomfort than their needs

• Why Continuous Improvement practitioners can fall into the trap of treating people like problems to solve

• A simple question to ask yourself before jumping in with a solution

 

Meet Quickshift: The Resistobot™ That Wants to Fix Everything

Quickshift sees a problem and immediately wants to do something about it.

And there's a lot to love about that. In Continuous Improvement, seeing problems, identifying root causes, and moving toward solutions are incredibly valuable skills.

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But when fixing becomes our automatic response, we can start solving problems that other people need to learn to solve themselves.

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The problem isn't that Quickshift exists. It's what happens when we let it take over.

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Are You Solving Their Problem—or Your Discomfort?

Have you ever found yourself working harder on someone else's problem than they are?

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You offer a solution. They push back. You explain it again. They raise another concern, so you offer another solution.

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Before you know it, you're exhausted from trying to help someone who doesn't seem to want your help.

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In this episode, I share a personal story about how my own Quickshift response got in the way of supporting my husband—and why our attempts to help can sometimes be driven by our own discomfort with watching someone struggle.

 

The CI Trap: When Everything Becomes a Problem to Solve

As Continuous Improvement practitioners, we're trained to identify problems, analyze root causes, and experiment with solutions.

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But what happens when we start treating another person's frustration, uncertainty, or resistance as just another problem to solve?

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We can skip an important question:

Does this person actually need me to solve this?

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Sometimes people need an answer. Other times, they need space to think, experiment, build confidence, and develop their own problem-solving capability.

 

Knowing the difference can change the impact we have as change leaders.

 

Helping vs. Empowering: What Are You Really Trying to Create?

There's a difference between making a problem easier for someone today and helping them become more capable of solving problems tomorrow.

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When we always jump in with the answer, we can unintentionally create a cycle of dependence: people bring us problems, we solve them, and then we get frustrated when they don't solve problems independently.

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So how do we break that cycle without abandoning people who genuinely need our help?

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It starts with getting intentional about the outcome we're trying to create—and recognizing that the fastest solution isn't always the best way to build capability.

 

What If You Asked Instead?

The next time you feel that familiar urge to jump in with the answer, try pausing and asking yourself:

“What am I trying to create right now?”

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Are you trying to solve an urgent operational problem? Build someone's capability? Create ownership? Make their discomfort go away—or your own?

 

Depending on your answer, the right response might be very different.

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Instead of immediately offering a solution, try asking:

• “What have you tried so far?”

• “What do you think is happening?”

• “What options are you considering?”

• “What would you like to try next?”

• “Do you want me to help you think through this, or do you want me to help you solve it?”

 

These questions help you stop assuming what kind of help someone needs and give them more ownership over the problem-solving process.

 

Resistance Is Information, Too

Quickshift doesn't just try to fix operational problems. It can also make us want to fix resistance.

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Someone says, “I've tried this before,” and we explain how we'll do things differently. Someone says, “I'm not comfortable with this,” and we try to show them how easy it will be.

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But resistance might be telling us something important about the future someone imagines, what they're afraid of losing, or a legitimate risk they see.

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When we immediately try to eliminate resistance, we may never understand what it's telling us.

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The goal isn't to become less action-oriented or stop solving problems. It's to create enough space to choose a response that actually produces the outcome we want.

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The Big Takeaway

Your ability to solve problems can become a problem when solving becomes your automatic response.

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Quickshift isn't bad. It's the part of you that sees a problem and wants to create movement.

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But when Quickshift takes over, you can accidentally take away ownership, create dependence, skip understanding, and turn resistance into something you feel responsible for eliminating.

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You don't have to fix it just because you can.

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Sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is help someone discover that they can solve it themselves.

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Your Experiment

For the next week, notice every time you feel the urge to jump in and fix something.

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You don't have to change your behavior yet. Just notice.

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Write down:

• What was happening?

• What did I immediately want to do?

• What was I hoping my fixing would create?

• What might have happened if I hadn't fixed it?

 

That last question might tell you a lot.

 

Links

Find Your Resistobot™

Quickshift

Credible Heard Used

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Transcript

Hey there, and welcome back to Thoughts on Change, the podcast where we make change make sense. If you've been listening to the last few episodes, we've been talking about resistance from a slightly different angle. We started with the idea that people may not actually be resisting the change itself. They may be resisting a future that they imagine the change will create. Then we dug into what they might be afraid of losing in that future. And last episode, we turned the lens around. Instead of asking, why are they resisting? We started asking, how am I responding to their resistance? Because sometimes without realizing it, our attempts to help can actually make resistance worse, not better. And today I want to zoom in on one particular response to resistance that I think is especially tempting for those of us who work in continuous improvement, operational excellence, lean, or change leadership. It's the response that says, oh, ooh, I know how to solve that. Someone has a problem, we see the problem, we know what the answer is. So naturally, we fix it. And then we wonder why they don't seem particularly grateful, or why they aren't using the solution, or why they somehow seem more resistant after we helped. So today we're talking about QuickShift. Welcome to Thoughts on Change, the podcast about the messy, political, emotional, deeply human side of leading change. I'm Kelly, and I believe anyone can implement lead tools until they actually have to get people to use them. Around here, we talk about how to move culture, how to build credibility, and how to influence without bulldozing. Basically, how to herd humans without losing your mind. Now, let me paint a picture. Someone comes to you with a problem. Maybe they're struggling with a process, maybe they're frustrated with a new system, maybe they tell you this isn't going to work. And as they're talking, you can already see it. The root cause, the countermeasure, the experiment, the tool, the thing they need to do next. You're practically bouncing in your chair because you can see the path forward. So you say, Have you tried this? Or, well, what if you just, or maybe you don't even ask. You just jump in, you redesign the process, you create the template, you build the visual, you make the connection, you schedule the meeting, you solve the problem. And in your mind, you're thinking, I am helping. And maybe you are. Sometimes the problem really does need solving. But here's the question I want you to consider. What happens when your solution becomes more important to you than their ability to solve the problem? If you listened to the last episode, you heard me introduce the resistibots. These aren't labels for other people, they're patterns in us, the ways we tend to respond when we're under pressure and when we face resistance. And Quickshift is the one that wants to fix it. Quickshift sees a problem and thinks, we don't need to sit here talking about this. We need to do something. Quickshift is action-oriented. It likes momentum. It likes solutions. It likes getting from problem to answer as quickly as possible. And honestly, there is a lot to love about that. In continuous improvement, being able to see problems and move toward action is incredibly valuable. Quickshift can help us avoid getting stuck in endless analysis. It can help us turn ideas into experiments. It can help us make progress. The problem isn't that quick shift exists. The problem is when quick shift becomes automatic in all situations. Because when we're uncomfortable with someone else's resistance, uncertainty, frustration, or struggle, fixing can become a way for us to feel better. Here's something I want you to notice. Imagine someone is struggling. You know the answer. You give them the answer. They push back. You explain it again. They still don't move. So you give them more information. They ask another question, you answer that one, they raise another concern, you offer another solution, and pretty soon you're working harder on their problem than they are. Does that sound familiar? I know I've absolutely been there. And I think there's a subtle question underneath all of this. Who needs the problem to be solved right now? Is it them or is it you? Because sometimes the discomfort isn't actually coming from their problem. It's coming from watching them struggle with the problem that you believe you can solve. That's a very different thing. And if we're not careful, we start fixing because we can't tolerate the feeling of not fixing. I think this trap is particularly easy for people in continuous improvement to fall into. We're trained to see problems. We learn how to break them down. We learn root cause analysis. We learn experimentation. We learn problem solving. We learn to ask questions. We learn to identify gaps between current and target conditions. And we learn to get so uncomfortable with the way things are done now that we want to jump out of our skin to make it better. This is our bread and butter, and it's incredibly useful. But here's the potential trap. When you get really good at seeing problems, you can start seeing everything as a problem to solve, including another human being. Someone is frustrated? Problem. Someone isn't following the process? Problem. Someone keeps asking questions? Problem. Someone isn't convinced? Problem. Someone doesn't want to do the thing we think they should do? Definitely problem. And once we've classified something as a problem, our brain starts looking for the solution automatically. Which means we can completely skip an important step. Does this person actually need me to solve this? This is something I actually ran into with my personal life. My husband has bad days, like many of us do. And when these would happen, I saw it as a problem. Feeling down, I know what to do. So I spent all of my time and energy trying to fix his mood. Not only did it not work, he got angry with me for not letting him feel the way he felt, which made me angry because couldn't he see I was just trying to help? And good news, he actually really helped me see that my quick shift was getting in the way and making things worse. Let's go back to that person who is struggling with a problem. You see the answer, you give them the answer, they use it. Great, right? Well, maybe. But what did they learn? Did they learn how to solve the problem? Or did they learn that you solve problems for them? Those are very two different outcomes. And this is where I think that distinction between helping and empowering gets really important. Helping can mean I'll make this easier for you. And empowering can mean I'll help you become more capable of making this easier for yourself. Now, sometimes those do overlap, but sometimes they don't. And if I'm always jumping in with the answer, I may be making the immediate problems smaller while making the future dependence on me bigger. And that can create a really strange dynamic. They bring me problems, I solve them. They become more dependent on me, I become more frustrated that they're not building capability in solving their own problems. So I push them to be more independent, and then they struggle. And when that happens, I jump back in and solve it. Congratulations, we've created a system. Now I can already hear the objection, but Kelly, what if I'm right? What if I know? Like, what if you actually know the answer? What if you've seen this problem ten times? What if you've done this before? What if you can solve it in five minutes and they're going to spend three weeks, three months struggling with it? Friends, this is where discomfort lives. Because being right doesn't automatically mean giving the answer is the right move. Sometimes the fastest way to solve the problem isn't the best way to build capability. And sometimes the person doesn't actually need the answer. They need to work through the problem themselves. They need to test their thinking. They need to experience the consequences. They need to build confidence. They need to discover something. They need to own the solution and the path to get there. And sometimes they really do just need the answer. And the point isn't that we should never fix things. The point is that we should check our automatic response and become more intentional about when we fix, when we coach, and when we get out of the damn way. So here's the experiment I want us all to try. The next time you feel that little internal surge of, ooh, ooh, I know what they should do. Don't immediately act on it. Pause and ask yourself, what am I trying to create right now? Am I trying to solve the immediate problem? Make their discomfort go away, make my discomfort go away, prove that I know the answer, get them moving, save them from making a mistake, build their capability, help them think, create ownership. There's nothing inherently wrong with any of those intentions. They just all create very different impacts. So if my real goal is to build capability, handing someone the answer may actually work against me. If my goal is to create ownership, taking over the problem probably isn't going to help. If my goal is simply to solve an urgent operational problem, then yes, sometimes I need to step in and solve it. The key here is knowing which game you're actually playing at any given time. And here's a simple alternative. Instead of here's what you should do, try what have you tried so far? Or what do you think is happening? Or what options are you considering? Or what would you like to try next? And sometimes the most useful question is: do you want me to help you think through this? Or do you want do you want me to help you solve it? That question alone can change the dynamic. Because now you're not assuming what help looks like. You're giving them some ownership over the kind of help they actually need. Now let's bring this on back to resistance because this isn't just about solving operational problems. We can try to fix resistance too. Right? Someone says, I don't think this is going to work. And Quick Shift says, okay, let's figure out what would. Let's figure out what would make it work. Someone says, I've tried this before. And Quick Shift says, okay, here's what we'll do differently. Someone says, I'm not comfortable with this. And QuickShift says, let me show you how easy it is. And before we know it, we've turned their resistance into another problem for us to solve. But remember what we talked about in the previous episodes. Their resistance may be telling us something about the future they're imagining. It may be pointing to something they're afraid they'll lose. It may be identifying a legitimate risk. Or it may simply be something they need to work through themselves. If we immediately try to fix it, we may never actually understand what it's telling us. So I'm not asking you to become less action-oriented. I'm not asking you to stop solving problems. And I'm definitely not suggesting that every person who resists change needs a long coaching conversation while the factory burns down around us. Sometimes you need to act. Sometimes you need to make the decision. Sometimes you need to remove the barrier. Sometimes you need to provide the answer. But before you do, try creating just a tiny bit of space between seeing the problem and solving the problem. Notice that impulse, that little voice that says, I know what to do. And instead of immediately following it, ask, what would actually produce the outcome I'm trying to create? Maybe the answer is fixing. But then again, maybe the answer is coaching. Maybe it's asking a question or listening. Or it's letting someone struggle a little. Maybe it's helping them discover something you already know. And that last one can be really hard. Because when you already know the answer, discovery feels painfully slow. But sometimes the capability you're trying to build is worth more than the problem you're trying to solve. So here's what I want you to take away from this episode. Your ability to solve problems can become a problem when solving becomes your automatic response. Quickshift isn't bad. Quickshift is useful. It's the part of you that sees a problem and wants to create movement. But when QuickShift takes over, you can accidentally solve problems. People need to learn to solve themselves, take away ownership, create dependence, skip understanding, and turn resistance into something you feel responsible for eliminating. So the next time you feel that urge to jump in with the answer, pause. Ask yourself, what am I trying to create? And then ask, what response would actually create that? You don't have to fix it just because you can. So for the next week, notice every time you have that urge to jump in and fix something. You don't have to change your behavior yet. Just start noticing and write down what was happening, what did you immediately want to do? What were you hoping that your fixing would create? And then ask what might have happened if you hadn't fixed it. And that last question might tell you a lot. In the next episode, we're going to look at another way change leaders can actually accidentally make resistance worse. Because maybe you're not fixing, maybe you're explaining. And explaining feels pretty harmless, right? Especially when you have more information. But what happens when showing that you know is the thing you're trying to accomplish? That's where we're headed next. Until then, remember, you don't have to fix every problem you can see. Sometimes the most powerful thing you can do is help someone see that they can solve it themselves. Thanks for listening to Thoughts on Change and see you next time. That's a wrap for this episode of Thoughts on Change. If you're also out there trying to move culture instead of just installing tools, hit subscribe and share this with a fellow CI warrior. And remember, progress beats perfection, curiosity beats control, and culture beats everything. See you next time.