by Tim Moore

 

                
To be a consultant means "to be killed multiple times." Often upon entering a 5-alarm crisis one realizes we have but two situational assets: intuition and information. Usually our intuition tells us we don't have enough information. "Guessing" is not part of the regimen.
 
Malcolm Gladwell draws an interesting parallel between a "puzzle" and a "mystery," which for those of us in the strategy business is an essential differentiation. Gladwell's What the Dog Saw credits National security heavyweight Greg Treverton with a famously accurate distinction between puzzles and mysteries. Osama bin Laden's whereabouts are a puzzle. We haven't found him because we lack sufficient information. The key to solving the bin Laden puzzle will most assuredly come to us with new information through a source within his inner circle. Until then, he remains on the lamb.
 
The question of what would happen in Iraq once dispossessed of its infamous dictator is, by contrast, a mystery. It was not a simple cause-and-effect proposition with a surgically factual answer. Mysteries in or outside of business require judgment and the assessment of the unknown, with the most difficult part not being our lack of information, but that we're often burdened with too much. In the case of post-Saddam Iraq, everyone had information; from the State Department to political scientists and pundits. But, so did every street merchant in Baghdad. The point here is that the distinction between puzzles and mysteries should not be overlooked in our unending obligation to make accurate decisions, honoring the eternal principle of "calculated risk." Truly gifted leaders employ these disctinctions to avoid the ambuscades of daily crisis.
 
If things go wrong when trying to solve a puzzle, finding the roadblock is relatively simple: indentify the person withholding solution-critical information. Mysteries however, are a different problem set entirely. Sometimes the facts you hold are like weak cards in a Poker game: not enough of the right information, poor analysis of the information we possess, and sometimes, the mystery simply can't be solved.  As you field the problems of the day, be they tactical or strategic, it's crucial to see puzzles and mysteries through a different prism. Puzzles are usually solved through straight line process. Mysteries often aren't.
 
When we stand back and organize our mind-chart to post and assess our threat array, we need to avoid applying an assessment model that really doesn't fit the dilemma. Too many managers fall into this murky footing, confusing time for results. It's what we refer to as the "let's get on with it" syndrome. Wars, political campaigns, epic athletic events, and entire companies have been lost based on the inability to rise above shoot-from-the-hip problem solving. Is it a puzzle or a mystery?