You're Solving the Wrong Problem. Here's How to Tell.
Solving problems in your business comes down to knowing what questions to ask.
Why? Because it makes you focus on the right thing. You can’t fix your issues by trying to solve the wrong things. And your problems will keep coming back, over and over again.
A big part of my work is helping figure out what clients actually need. They come in with a request like X, but I need to ask them what they’re trying to achieve to get them asking the right question — and guide them through that.
If you start by asking “I feel overwhelmed by all the email updates I have to send to my clients every week. How do I set up automated email notifications for every project milestone so I miss no deadlines?” instead of “Why are my clients feeling out of the loop? What information actually matters to them at each stage?” — you’re going to end up with a different set of problems instead of actually doing less work.
If you want to improve your business, learn how to ask the right questions. Here are the most common ones I see, and what better questions look like:
PROJECT DELAYS ❌ Wrong: “How can I build a better Gantt chart system?” ✅ Good: “How do I get a realistic timeline for each project?” ✅✅ Better: “Why do our timelines keep slipping? Is it an estimation problem or an accountability problem?”
TEAM CAPACITY ❌ Wrong: “How do I implement a resource allocation module in our PM tool?” ✅ Good: “How do I know when my team is overloaded?” ✅✅ Better: “Why do we keep saying yes to work we can’t handle? Where is the breakdown in our decision-making?”
DUPLICATE WORK ❌ Wrong: “How do I integrate all our tools into one platform?” ✅ Good: “How do I stop tasks from falling through the cracks?” ✅✅ Better: “Why are two people working on the same thing? Is it a process problem or a communication problem?”
SCOPE CREEP ❌ Wrong: “How do I track change requests in our project management software?” ✅ Good: “How do I protect project scope without angering the client?” ✅✅ Better: “Why are clients adding requirements mid-project? Did we fail to define expectations upfront?”
ONBOARDING NEW CLIENTS ❌ Wrong: “How do I automate our client onboarding checklist?” ✅ Good: “How do I get new clients productive faster?” ✅✅ Better: “Why do new clients feel lost in the first two weeks? What’s actually missing from their experience?”
REPORTING & VISIBILITY ❌ Wrong: “How do I build a real-time dashboard for all my projects?” ✅ Good: “How do I give stakeholders the updates they need?” ✅✅ Better: “Why do stakeholders keep asking where things stand? Are we reporting too much, too little, or the wrong things?”
KNOWLEDGE LOSS ❌ Wrong: “How do I set up a wiki or knowledge base in our system?” ✅ Good: “How do I keep institutional knowledge from walking out the door?” ✅✅ Better: “Why does everything stop when one person is unavailable? What decisions are living only in someone’s head?”
DUPLICATE WORK ACROSS TOOLS ❌ Wrong: “How do I integrate ServiceM8, ClickUp, n8n, and Google Workspace together?” ✅ Good: “How do I stop work from falling through the cracks between my tools?” ✅✅ Better: “Why do I need four tools to do this? Which part of my workflow actually requires separation and which part is just fragmented?”
WORKSPACE STRUCTURE PARALYSIS ❌ Wrong: “Should I use separate Spaces, Folders, or Lists for each department?” ✅ Good: “How do I organize ClickUp so it doesn’t become a mess as we grow?” ✅✅ Better: “Why does my structure keep breaking? Am I building for how the tool works instead of how my team actually operates?”
SCALING WITHOUT LOSING CONTROL ❌ Wrong: “How do I build a complete operating system inside Notion that tracks everything?” ✅ Good: “How do I keep visibility as my client list grows?” ✅✅ Better: “Why am I saying no to new clients? Is it actually a tool problem, or do I need to fix how work gets handed off and tracked before adding more automation?”
VISIBILITY AS A CEO/OWNER ❌ Wrong: “How do I build a real-time dashboard that shows all projects, all teams, all statuses?” ✅ Good: “How do I know where things stand without asking everyone?” ✅✅ Better: “What do I actually need to see to make decisions? I probably don’t need everything — I need the right three things.”
AUTOMATION SCOPE CREEP ❌ Wrong: “How do I find someone to build automations between all my tools?” ✅ Good: “How do I reduce the manual work that’s slowing my team down?” ✅✅ Better: “Which specific step is actually costing me time or causing errors? I might need one automation, not a full system rebuild.”
Keeping your focus on what’s important — and avoiding anything that makes you solve the wrong problem — is what will actually move your business forward.
