Friction is inevitable. These are the five links where it gets stuck.
Each link carries its own failure. Each one builds on the one before it. Friction stops at the first broken link. Everything after it inherits the flaw.
You can't see what you've stopped noticing.
We go blind to our own situation. Pieces of the puzzle go missing, not because they're hidden, but because they've become normal. Stuck here, you play whack-a-mole with problems that keep re-emerging.
The wrong answer, arrived at carefully.
When the diagnosis doesn't span the whole organization, it finds symptoms instead of causes. Every transformation then feels like the answer to everything, and delivers almost nothing.
Clarity without ownership.
Plenty of organizations know exactly what isn't working. What's missing is someone who owns the decision to fix it. When no one does, nothing happens, and nobody can say why.
A decision without mandate.
Making the decision is one thing. Having the authority to carry it through is another. Deciding without mandate is the fastest way to ruin a culture.
Everything has a sweet spot.
Companies, products, people, suppliers, customers. Leaving a segment, letting someone go, changing a supplier isn't failure. It's evolving. Skip it, and you end up solving today's problems with yesterday's tools.