Robert’s Six Laws of Holes

Posted by Robert Merrill on August 8, 2011 under Process Improvement | Be the First to Comment

What do you do when you realize you’ve dug yourself a hole?

I’m talking about the kind of holes that we dig ourselves in business, or the kind of gigantic hole that we in the United States have dug ourselves.

1. Stop digging (Will Rogers). Doing whatever you’ve been doing, only with more fervor, is probably going to result in more hole.
2. Re-evaluate your thinking (Albert Einstein, Part I). We all have mental models of the world and the people who populate it. They’re essential approximations of reality because reality is too much for our little brains (or we’re just in denial). But like all models, they’re approximations, and therefore inaccurate. The presence of a big hole is a good sign that your old model is, or has become, waaaay inaccurate. “There are no crises, only ends of illusions.”
3. Change your thinking (Albert Einstein, Part II). Replace your inaccurate model with a better one. An outside perspective can really help here, because we can get so ingrained in our thinking. An outside perspective, or even force, can also be necessary when organizational politics are in play. Regardless of how flawed the current model, there are always powers and influences that benefit from it, or stand to lose if it’s abandoned, or just aren’t feeling the pain from the flaws. And their thinking is just fine, thank you very much. If you can’t work around them, you have to win them over, or put them off of Jim Collins’ metaphorical bus, or shake the dust off your feet and move on.
4. Adjust your expectations. No, down. Nope, some more. My personal contribution to Holeology, I think, is the Law of the Symmetry of Holes. If it’s taken you ten years to dig it, you’re not getting out in 10 weeks or even 10 months. It might not take 10 years, but it will be years, not months or weeks.
5. Prepare to persevere. This is another way of saying, “Adjust your expectations.” Jim Collins, in “Good to Great,” calls it the Stockdale Paradox. “Confront the brutal facts, but never give up hope.” Once the initial cathartic rush of the collective admission that We’ve Dug A Hole has passed, you have to get to work according to the new model. And you won’t have much to show at first. It’s like paying off a mortgage. You’ll grow weary, the naysayers will circle and told-you-so, and you’ll be tempted to chuck the whole thing and go back to living in the hole. If your plan for climbing out and filling in includes some quick wins, even symbolic ones, that can make all the difference. Think Doolittle Raid. Just don’t confuse that with winning the war.
6. Evaluate and adjust. This requires experience and a deft touch. There are times when you just need to stay the course, and there are times when you need to make adjustments. One of my mentors at the National Hurricane Center said that the difference between the good forecasters and the great ones was that the great ones knew exactly when it was time to amend the forecast.

When it comes to holes, my particular specialty is software development holes. If your projects mostly blow up and every bug you fix results in two more, you’re in a hole. There are ways out, but you’re going to have to stop digging, change your thinking, adjust your expectations, prepare to persevere, and evaluate and adjust. From experience, it will take a few months to a year to begin seeing improvements, depending upon how long your project cycle is. But oh what a feeling when you start seeing them.