The Root Cause: Rethink Your Approach to Solving Stubborn Enterprise-Wide Problems

“Impeccably researched and astoundingly insightful, The Root Cause reveals how to go from ‘putting out fires’ to finding true, lasting solutions& A must-read guide for executives and leaders at any stage of their career!”—Marshall Goldsmith, Thinkers50 #1 Leadership Thinker and #1 New York Times bestselling author of Triggers

Sooner or later, every executive has to confront problems that seem to be built into the way the business was designed, maintained, and managed. Whether it’s information overload, profit margin issues, or adapting to new regulations, popular “best practices” don’t solve those problems. High-level executives, it turns out, are often the least able to diagnose—much less solve—an organization’s systemic problems. Hans Norden draws on a wealth of experience in in-house change management to help both established and up-and-coming C-suite leaders analyze the problems and create authentic, sustainable solutions.

In The Root Cause, readers will learn how executing change initiatives requires a different form of leadership than routine operations. Norden explains why systemic problems fester, manifesting as disruptions in the workflow of different departments and levels in the company.

You’ll discover:

• Why systemic problems keep recurring and thus appear to be without solution.
• Why solving systemic problems is a unique and exclusive executive responsibility.
• Why a business managed as a collection of separate component parts will experience friction and conflict—and why most business “best practices” are fallacies
• Why identifying the right solution to a systemic problem becomes easy when using a bigger picture perspective
• Why leaders with a clear vision of the desired future state are better positioned to respond in a timely and adequate manner

While top-down management may work on a day-to-day basis, managing and fixing systemic problems requires intelligent collaboration with other management levels to implement improvements. Providing a clear, step-by-step road map to diagnosing issues and establishing authentic, holistic, and sustainable solutions, The Root Cause shows leaders a way to solve the seemingly unsolvable problems—and prevent more from arising in the future.

About the Author

Hans Norden is the principal and owner of Anticipated Outcome, a boutique provider of forward-thinking change leadership services. A native of The Netherlands, he was senior in-house change management consultant for the ING Group at their international headquarters in Amsterdam before relocating to the U.S. He studied international marketing, business economics and philosophy and received his professional training at NMB Bank and Cap Gemini. He, has presented his work at many prestigious conferences and executive training seminars, including the International Deming Research Seminar (Fordham University, NY), the Rady School of Management, the School for Business Administration (University of San Diego), and the American Society for Training and Development.