Want rapid growth in your career and life? Find the root cause of the problem faster

Recently, I won the biggest award in my company, MD/CEO choice of Award. When you win this, you get cash prize and dinner with MD and CEO. It was overwhelming and unexpected. Sure, I work very hard, but I have worked hard before but had never seen such recognition before in my career.

I asked our Managing Director one question, while he was engrossed in eating delicious food from an expensive restaurant we were in, “How do you finish work on time? You certainly have more tasks, more problems to solve in a day than me. I never get to finish everything on time and things get carry forwarded to the next day giving me sleepless night.” He answered promptly as if there was only one answer to this, “Find the root cause of any problem fast. Get to the bottom of it and pull it out. You’re done. Your ability to get to it fast will determine how fast you grow.” I felt like I found the root cause of the major problem and not just that this will give me rapid growth in my career.

We often fall in love with our to-do list so much that we remain stuck just looking at it and never coming to a conclusion. Why can’t we just target checking them all off in the first half of the day and use the second half in learning something new or help that junior who keeps asking questions, but you can’t help because of the things piling up your own to-do list.