Move Fast and Fix Things

Picture yourself facing a critical deadline with your team scattered, morale low, and stakeholders losing patience. You know something needs to change, but traditional approaches feel glacially slow. Meanwhile, competitors are racing ahead, and every day of delay costs opportunities. This scenario isn't just common—it's become the default state for many organizations caught between the pressure to accelerate and the fear of breaking what already works.

The truth is, we don't have to choose between speed and stability, between moving fast and taking care of people. The most successful leaders today have discovered a different path—one that harnesses urgency as a force for positive transformation while building deeper trust with everyone around them. This isn't about reckless disruption or cautious incrementalism. It's about mastering a disciplined approach to change that gets results without leaving casualties in its wake.

The foundation of meaningful change lies not in having all the answers, but in asking better questions. Most organizations mistake symptoms for root causes, spending months solving the wrong problems while the real issues continue to fester. True problem identification requires the courage to look beyond surface complaints and dig into the uncomfortable truths that explain why excellence feels so elusive.

Consider the story of AJ Hubbard at GE Appliances, who was brought in to address what seemed like straightforward diversity challenges. Rather than accepting the obvious narrative, Hubbard insisted on examining the data together with his team. They discovered that the real issue wasn't just hiring or promotion rates—it was a systematic failure to understand who was joining, leaving, and thriving within the company. By creating a dashboard that made organizational patterns visible, they transformed speculation into actionable insight.

The process begins with building a diverse team of problem hunters—people who aren't afraid to challenge assumptions and can see the organization from different angles. Gather existing data before collecting new information, and resist the urge to converge too quickly on familiar explanations. Ask yourself: What would you need to believe for the current situation to make perfect sense? Then systematically test those beliefs against reality.

Success in this phase means arriving at a problem statement so clear and compelling that solving it becomes an organizational imperative. When you can describe your challenge in simple terms that resonate with stakeholders across the company, you've earned the right to move to solutions.

Moving from problem identification to solution requires a fundamental shift in mindset—from knowing to learning, from perfection to iteration. The organizations that accelerate sustainable change treat every intervention as an experiment, gathering evidence about what works while building confidence in their ability to adapt. This experimental approach doesn't mean being careless; it means being systematically curious about what creates the conditions for people and systems to thrive.

The story of NerdWallet's "Fail Wall" illustrates this philosophy in action. Rather than hiding mistakes, employees celebrated learning by posting sticky notes about experiments that didn't work as expected. CEO Tim Chen's own contribution—acknowledging his misstep in outsourcing PR—signaled that intelligent failure was not just tolerated but valued as a source of organizational wisdom. This transparency transformed the company culture from risk aversion to rapid learning.

Trust rebuilding happens through three interconnected dimensions: demonstrating logic through capable strategy execution, showing empathy by genuinely caring about stakeholder needs, and maintaining authenticity by aligning words with actions. Design small experiments that address whichever dimension feels most wobbly in your organization. Test changes in how work gets done, how people develop their capabilities, or how decisions get made. Document what you learn and adjust quickly.

The goal isn't to get everything right immediately—it's to prove that your organization can learn and adapt faster than problems can emerge. When stakeholders see evidence of thoughtful progress, trust compounds and creates the foundation for more ambitious change.

High performance and inclusion aren't opposing forces—they're complementary capabilities that amplify each other's impact. The most innovative and resilient organizations have discovered that welcoming diverse perspectives isn't just morally right, it's strategically essential. When people can bring their full selves to work and contribute their unique insights, teams make better decisions, solve problems more creatively, and respond more effectively to complex challenges.

Kevin Nolan, CEO of GE Appliances, captured this reality perfectly when he acknowledged that diversity feels uncomfortable because it challenges existing patterns and assumptions. Rather than pretending this discomfort doesn't exist, successful leaders lean into it as a source of competitive advantage. The temporary friction of integrating different viewpoints pays dividends in expanded thinking and better outcomes.

Creating inclusive excellence requires intentional progression through four levels: ensuring everyone feels safe, helping them feel welcome, celebrating their unique contributions, and championing difference throughout the organization. Start by surveying your team anonymously to understand where people currently experience belonging. Address safety issues immediately—these are non-negotiable foundations. Then work systematically to expand who gets heard, whose ideas get implemented, and whose potential gets developed.

The breakthrough happens when uniqueness becomes valued rather than tolerated. When team members know their different perspectives are actively sought and integrated, they share insights that would otherwise remain hidden. This unleashes the kind of collective intelligence that makes seemingly impossible challenges solvable.

Ideas alone don't create transformation—stories do. The most effective change leaders understand that people need more than logical arguments; they need narratives that help them see themselves as part of something meaningful. A compelling change story connects the organization's history to its future possibilities while creating a bridge that people can actually cross.

When T-Mobile CEO Jon Legere positioned his company as the "un-carrier," he wasn't just describing a strategy—he was creating an identity that employees and customers could embrace. The story acknowledged everything wrong with the wireless industry while offering a clear alternative that felt both ambitious and achievable. This narrative simplicity masked sophisticated operational changes, but it gave everyone involved a north star for decision-making.

Effective change stories follow a three-part structure: honoring what's worth preserving from the past, articulating why change is urgently needed, and describing a rigorous but optimistic path forward. Don't skip the first part—people need to know you understand and value what they've built before they'll trust you to help rebuild it. Be honest about past mistakes without dwelling on blame, and focus forward momentum on shared possibilities.

The power of your story multiplies through repetition. Plan to communicate your message far more frequently than feels comfortable—what seems redundant to you is just beginning to penetrate busy, distracted minds throughout the organization. When you're tired of hearing yourself tell the story, you're probably just getting started.

True urgency isn't about creating panic or sacrificing quality—it's about achieving focused intensity that honors both the importance of your mission and the people executing it. Organizations that master this balance discover they can move faster by removing barriers rather than pushing harder, by empowering more people to make decisions rather than centralizing control, and by choosing what not to do as carefully as what to prioritize.

The transformation at Etsy under CEO Josh Silverman demonstrates the power of strategic reduction. When Silverman discovered his team was managing over 800 projects simultaneously, he didn't ask people to work harder—he eliminated half the initiatives. This application of Little's Law (completion time equals work in process multiplied by cycle time) freed the organization to make meaningful progress on what mattered most.

Execution excellence requires making tough trade-offs explicit rather than pretending you can be great at everything. Southwest Airlines built a profitable business model by choosing to be deliberately bad at certain services (assigned seating, meals, baggage transfers) in order to excel at what customers valued most (low prices and reliable schedules). These choices felt uncomfortable but created sustainable competitive advantage.

The key is building organizational systems that support speed rather than demanding it through willpower alone. Improve meeting quality by preparing agendas and defining clear outcomes. Create fast-track mechanisms for high-priority projects. Address conflicts directly rather than letting them slow progress. When you remove friction from important work, urgency feels energizing rather than exhausting.

The path to moving fast while fixing things isn't about choosing between speed and care—it's about discovering how these qualities reinforce each other when applied with skill and intention. Organizations that master this integration find themselves operating from a position of strength, able to respond quickly to challenges while building deeper trust with everyone they serve.

As the authors remind us throughout this journey, "There is such a thing as being too late." The window for meaningful change is always smaller than we imagine, and the cost of delay compounds daily. Yet the solution isn't reckless action—it's disciplined urgency applied to the right problems with the right people.

Your next step is deceptively simple: pick one problem that's been frustrating your team, gather a small group of diverse thinkers, and commit to making measurable progress within a week. Start with curiosity rather than solutions, build trust through small experiments, and tell the story of what you're learning along the way. The moment that matters most is now.