LinkedIn Complex vs Complicated Leadership Problems

As a leader tasked with bringing about change, you’re faced with daily challenges. Your teams look to you for guidance on how to tackle the most complicated and complex issues in their work environment. You use your experience to work out the way forward. Why is it, that sometimes the results you expect and want, don’t materialise? 

It might be because you are tackling all change in the same way. Using tried and tested approaches. It makes sense, but because complicated and complex are not the same thing, you are coming up short. 

A complicated problem may have many parts or components, but it can be addressed by bringing experts together to find a solution using well established processes. For example – developing an automated solution for an existing service. 

Complex problems are difficult to understand, have interconnected variables and unpredictable outcomes. For example – transforming the organisation culture to be customer centric. 

When leading change it pays to understand these differences to ensure the right approach to be successful. 

Complicated changes can be solved with a more traditional problem-solving approach, by breaking the issue down and then building plans using established processes to address the issue. Your sponsorship will involve creating confidence about who does what and when, and helping teams understand the key steps to get to the shared outcome.

However, when faced with complex change you must adopt a different mindset. Embrace the uncertainty and approach the issue with curiosity and an open mind. This means asking questions, seeking out diverse perspectives, and experimenting with solutions. You’ll need a collaborative approach to engage others to co-create the solution. 

In my experience, leaders are less confident when faced with complexity, despite the increasingly complex world they operate in. 

Focusing on a few key areas can help.

• Develop your leaders. Support them to learn how to successfully navigate ambiguity and build their change management capability. Their competence will elevate your confidence. 

• Build team connection. Cohesion and collaboration are critical to develop solutions, encourage experimentation and in building resilience when things don’t go as expected. 

• Communicate clearly, concisely, and consistently. Well thought out communications are important for all change processes, but especially when the outcome is unpredictable or unknown. 

Need more help? I’ve worked with hundreds of leaders to embed successful and sustainable change over the long term.