You’ve heard the phrase
“move fast and break things.” Facebook made it famous. But really, Mark just made the mistake
of saying it out loud and putting it on company posters. By the way, Mark and I
are not on a first-name basis. (Laughter) But sometimes using
the first names of our leaders reminds us that leadership is a practice of imperfect humans
leading imperfect humans. That's why it's so hard. How's it going, Elon? (Laughter) Move fast and break things is still a widely held belief
that we can either make progress or take care of each other,
one or the other. That a certain amount of wreckage
is the price we have to pay for inventing the future. My wife and I have spent the last decade
helping companies clean up this wreckage. And one of the main lessons from our work is that the trade-off
at the heart of this worldview is false. The most effective leaders we know

solve problems at an accelerated pace, while also taking responsibility
for the success and the well-being of their customers,
employees, and shareholders. They move fast and fix things. (Applause) Now, what's come out of our work
is something of a playbook for fixing problems quickly, whether it's a broken company culture
or a struggling friendship. And so what I want to do
with you today is invite you to try on this playbook
over the course of an imaginary week. So how this is going to work
is I'm going to give you an agenda for each day of the week,
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. You see where this is going. And then I want you to go home and try it and see how much progress you can make. Does that sound reasonable? OK. I'm seeing some signs
of consent, thank you. Start by thinking of a problem
that you're having right now that involves at least one other person, your kids, your co-founders,
your customers, etc.

Now in our imaginary week, it's now Monday morning. Now Monday morning, it's a bad rap, but we like to think of it
as the gift of renewal that comes around every seven days. (Laughter) On Monday, your task is to figure out
what your real problem is, which may not be the problem
that you thought you had just a minute ago. Because here's the thing. As human beings, we tend to be overconfident
in the quality of our thoughts. Particularly when it comes
to diagnosing our own problems. My investors don't get it. My Gen Z employees are entitled. My dog is mad at me. Let's find out if you're right. The thing that's going to help you out
most today is your own curiosity. So turn that original diagnosis,
My Gen Z employees are entitled, into a question rather than a statement. What's going on with my Gen Z employees? Now your next move sounds obvious.

but you might be surprised to learn
how infrequently people actually do it. Talk directly to the other people
who have a stake in your problem. Ask some things you might not
normally ask in polite company, things that require
a little courage on your part. Now, as I look around the room,
and I'm being a little presumptuous, I suspect this is going to be
hard for some of you. I get it, I come from a very WASPy family. There were three approved
topics of conversation: the pets, the weather, and Tom Brokaw, for some reason. (Laughter) But sometimes just a single
brave conversation can reveal an entirely new
structure to your problem. Some of you will discover, for example, that you have a role to play in creating the problem
that you're now solving this week. Instead of your Gen Z employees
being entitled, for example, you might discover it's you
who feels entitled.

To burn them out and pay them
less than what they're worth, simply because that was
the broken work contract that you put up with at their age. (Applause). I'm just spitballing up here. (Laughter). But what I do know is that whatever
it is you learn today, you're going to be closer to understanding what's really getting in the way
of the relationship or the organization or the life you want. Alright, excellent first day, everyone. Get some rest. Now it's Tuesday. On Tuesday, your job
is to run a smart experiment in how to solve your problem. Start by creating a good-enough plan to strengthen the relationship
at the center of it. Now, a good-enough plan
is distinct from a perfect plan, which is an elusive, fantastical creature that has never actually
been spotted in the wild. We tend to think about problems
through the lens of trust. So one prompt that often helps on Tuesday.

is what could you do tomorrow
to build more trust than you did today? For one team, we were working with, they decided to stop texting
each other about each other in the middle of meetings. (Laughter) Someone else we were coaching decided that it was time to come clean
to his co-founders that he was ready
to move on from the business. Another leader decided that it was time
for him to take full responsibility for the unintended harms
of a product that he'd designed. Is your good-enough plan going to work? Probably not. Statistically, not on the first try. That's why I'm giving you all
a week to figure it out. But also to make the inevitable,
unavoidable mistakes. The purpose of Tuesday
is not to get it right. The purpose of Tuesday is to learn. It's to get into the sandbox of your life
and give yourself permission to play. Alright, go and have the adult
beverage of your choice.

which you have definitely earned. Now it’s Wednesday. On Wednesday, your job is to do something
that adults generally don't like to do. It's to make new friends. But the research is really clear. That whatever problem
you're trying to solve this week, you're going to be better at solving it with people who don't already
think like you do. I know you've heard this
before many times. But today is your chance to practice. So describe your good-enough plan,
the one you came up with yesterday, to someone whose life experience
has been materially different from yours. If you've been
at the company for a decade, talk to someone who started last week. If you're a white partner,
talk to a Black partner. If you're queer like me, talk to the straightest
person you can find. (Laughter) Contrary to what you may have heard
recently, they're everywhere. (Laughter)

(Applause.) And when you're done
with that conversation, have another conversation with someone
else who's different from you on some other gorgeous dimension
of the human experience. This is going to take you all day, and some of you are going to be
surprised to discover that it’s your favorite day of the week. At the end of the day,
you’re going to be smiling, and your good-enough plan
is going to be an even-better plan. OK, now it's Thursday, good morning. It's Thursday, you're unstoppable. Thursday is storytelling day. As humans, we need stories
to make sense of change, to find our place in the script of it. Stories also help us to activate
all the other people around us whose help we're going to need
with that change. Stories have three parts:
past, present, future. We often skip over that past part
in moments of big change. We did some work with Uber.

when it was going through its very
public crisis in leadership. And when the new guy came in, the new CEO, and hosted his first all-hands meeting, he committed to retain the edge that had made Uber a force of nature. Now, this line was met
with thunderous applause. The applause of relief. He also joined in a standing ovation
for his predecessor, who also happened to be
in the room that day. I was so struck by the grace of this choice. And that's the word I want you
to bring to your own storytelling. Listen, Uber had serious
problems to solve, as anyone reading the news
could figure out. But the people in that room
had built something extraordinary, and they had something real to lose
in an uncertain future. Instead of setting himself up
as some kind of company savior, the new guy honored
that complicated truth. Honor the complicated truth
of the people around you, the ones who aren't so sure
about all your big plans.

Then tell us why you want
to change things. Finally, tell us about the future
in vivid and specific language. Tell us what it's going to feel like
when your story becomes our reality. Alright, it's Friday. It's Friday, and you're almost
done, I promise. The payoff of Friday, the payoff of this whole week of hard work, is that you now get to move fast because you're far less likely
to break things. So do everything you decided to do
over the last week, but now do it with a sense of urgency. Urgency releases the energy in the system. It makes it clear to everyone
that you take the problem seriously. So whatever administrative hurdles, whatever unproductive process
is in the way of taking action today, just strip it out,
just refuse to tolerate it. People ask us all the time
about the optimal timing for big change. And our answer is almost always the same. How about now?

Now seems good. Take action now, and then learn from whatever happens next. And at the end of this day,
at the end of this week, your even-better plan
has a chance of being a great plan. Alright, that’s it. That's your week. Congratulations, you did it, as you rest
and recover, which is essential. I want to leave you
with one final thought. I spend my time helping leaders to change and evolve. And no one has ever said to me, I wish I had taken longer and done less. (Laughter) What I do hear again and again
is the opposite. And so my invitation to you
today is to practice. To practice taking less time to do more of the things that will make
your relationships and your teams and your organizations stronger. And to be honest, you have my blessing to take longer than a week to get it done. What I don't want you to do is to take months or even years.

which tends to be our default timeline
for solving hard problems. Most of our problems deserve
a more urgent response. Most of our problems deserve
a metabolic rate that honors the frustration
and the mediocrity, and the real pain
of the status quo for some of you. Thank you. (Laughter and applause) So whether your name is Mark
or Elon or Chris -- thank you for having me -- or Anne, find out what happens
when you move fast and fix things, and decide that the moment
that matters most is right now. (Applause and cheers)

5 Steps to Fix Any Problem at Work | Anne Morriss | TED

The TED Talks channel features the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). Look for talks on Technology, Entertainment and Design -- plus science, business, global issues, the arts and more. You're welcome to link to or embed these videos, forward them to others and share these ideas with people you know.

TED's videos may be used for non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons License, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives (or the CC BY – NC – ND 4.0 International) and in accordance with our TED Talks Usage Policy: https://www.ted.com/about/our-organization/our-policies-terms/ted-talks-usage-policy. For more information on using TED for commercial purposes (e.g. employee learning, in a film or online course), please submit a Media Request at https://media-requests.ted.com