Common Problem Solving Mistakes That Hinder Solutions
Identify frequent errors in problem-solving, such as premature solutions and focusing on symptoms rather than root causes.
Page Summary
A catalog of common problem-solving mistakes, opening with Target's 5.4 billion dollar Canadian expansion failing because leadership treated symptoms (supply chain) while the root causes were location, assortment, and price. It covers jumping to solutions, treating symptoms rather than root causes, confirmation bias in analysis, accepting the first explanation, analysis paralysis, optimizing the wrong metrics, binary thinking, not involving the right perspectives, and anchoring on sunk costs, with the meta-mistake being the absence of a structured process.
Contributions
Every accepted correction to this page is recorded with the exact change, so readers can see how the page improved over time.
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Vuori and Huy's Nokia study was published in Administrative Science Quarterly (2016), not the Academy of Management Journal.
Beforestudied by researchers Timo Vuori and Quy Huy at INSEAD (Academy of Management Journal, 2016)
Afterstudied by researchers Timo Vuori and Quy Huy at INSEAD (Administrative Science Quarterly, 2016)
Why: Vuori and Huy's Nokia study was published in Administrative Science Quarterly (2016), not the Academy of Management Journal. Verified the live article body already cites the correct journal. The faq field does not mention Vuori, Huy, or the Nokia case study at all, so no secondary fix was needed there.
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