Struggling to Change? Ask Yourself Why. Five Times.

I saw corporate change initiatives flop all the time. Why? Because time was spent addressing symptoms of the problem. Applying bandaids instead of addressing what the real issue was.

My consulting teams know how passionate I am about root cause analysis. I have spent hours whiteboarding to drive meaningful change for my clients. But I had never thought of applying it to my personal life. Until recently.

Shape magazine issued an article titled “The 30-Day Push-Up Challenge for Seriously Sculpted Arms”. I had tried but failed many times at taking on challenges like this. So I rallied my friends and family to take the challenge with me.

I procrastinated every day. And every day, I asked myself why? It took less than a minute. Why couldn’t I get it done? Why did I even care about wanting to do a stupid push-up anyways?

A lightbulb went off. When we encountered a problem in consulting, we used an approach called The Five Whys. It is a technique developed by Sakichi Toyoda, the founder of Toyota Industries Corporation, and is widely used in lean methodologies.

The basic idea is when a problem occurs, the first solution typically won’t prevent it from recurring. But if you keep asking “why” five times (more or less), you will find the root cause. Then you can develop a solution that will stick and prevent the problem from recurring.

Ok, here it goes:

Problem: Why do I want to be able to do push-ups? Answer: To feel stronger.

If I stop here, my action plan is: Do push-ups every day to feel stronger. But I’ve tried that already. It didn’t work.

Problem: Ok, why don’t you feel strong. Answer: Because I haven’t worked out consistently for the past decade.

Action Plan: Set a workout program. Yep, been there, done that. It didn’t work either.

Problem: Why haven’t you worked out consistently? Answer: Because I haven’t stuck to my goals.

Action Plan: Establish a system to build better habits. Getting warmer.

Problem: Why can’t you stick to your goals? Answer: I’ve failed so many times that I don’t think it’s possible to change.

Root Cause: Fear of failure. Now we’re getting somewhere.

Action Plan: Once I realized that not following through on the push-up challenge was a symptom of my fear of failure, I created an action plan to address that issue instead. It became easier to do the push-ups once I understood why I was resisting them in the first place.

I asked a few people close to me to ask themselves “why” five times about a specific problem they were facing in their lives:

• Struggling to lose five pounds was indicative of a relationship issue they had been avoiding.
• Feeling guilty over a dinner party stemmed from being depressed.
• Developing a drinking habit started after a loss and not dealing with grief.

So the next time you are struggling with a problem, ask yourself “why” five times. Find the root cause and start there instead. You might find the other issues resolve themselves.