One of the questions I often ask leadership teams is surprisingly simple:

“What are the three most important things your organization needs to improve?” The answers come quickly.

• “We need to improve communication.”
• “We need to develop our supervisors.”
• “We need to reduce lead times.”
• “We need better cross-functional collaboration.” “We need to become more proactive.”

The conversation rarely stalls because leaders don’t know what needs to improve. In fact, most organizations have a remarkably accurate understanding of their biggest challenges.

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