Are you fixing fires—or the fault that starts them?
In one business I joined, “firefighting” was the norm. People rushed from crisis to crisis, but the underlying issues never got solved. It reminded me of an electrical fault: instead of repairing the wiring, everyone just kept dousing the sparks.
If you don’t fix the fault, you’ll always be battling the next fire.
Sometimes, it makes sense to let small fires burn—Reid Hoffman did this at PayPal, focusing only on the blazes that truly mattered. But too often, fighting fires becomes the job itself. People get comfortable in the chaos. When asked why, they say, “It’s just how we do things here.” That phrase always sends a shiver down my spine.
There are really only two ways to solve a problem:
Personally, I love digging for the cause. It’s like unwrapping a present—I want to peel back the layers of assumptions and get to the core. Once you see the fundamentals, you can rebuild from the ground up. Sometimes, just removing old beliefs is enough to stop the problem.
But what if it isn’t? Then it’s time to reason from first principles.
I’ve written about how to do this (with an example that isn’t from Elon Musk!). If you’re ready to break the cycle and fix the real fault, check out the article below.
Reasoning From First Principles
What fires are you fighting right now? And which ones could you prevent for good?
