Ask a leadership team how many hours went into last quarter’s operating review. Then ask how many of those hours went into a problem the team had already solved once before. Watch how the room reacts to the second question.

That reaction is the tell. Most organizations don’t have language for it, much less a number, because they’ve never separated a new problem from an old one wearing a different name. A fire that’s fought instead of extinguished at the source doesn’t stay out. It comes back, and the second and third responses cost more than the first: more meeting time, more credibility lost with the board, more of the leadership team’s attention pulled away from the work that actually moves the business forward.

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