Turn Complaints into Actions

I remember when I was just out of college and working as an engineer designing blood glucose monitors for personal use. I was frustrated with the long development time and thought there could be a better way. I voiced my complaints to an engineer mentor of mine. He looked at me and simply said, “what are you going to do about it?” He basically was saying that he didn’t want to hear any complaints unless I had a proposal for how to fix or address a given situation. I ended up working with a number of colleagues outside of normal work hours as we created a “tiger team” that spent several months working on ways to streamline the development process and cut months off the timeline. We presented our ideas to management, and they were adopted and used as a standard going forward. The Tiger Team was the action that stemmed from our complaint.

I’ve used my mentor’s comment hundreds if not thousands of times over the years. Whenever someone says something that sounds like a complaint, I’ll just ask them what they are going to do about it. Sometimes they say they can’t do anything about it, and then that is when I tell them that they need to stop complaining and either accept what it is or give a proposal for improving the situation. People often are surprised at their own ability to effect change in an organization. If a process is broken or inefficient, most people will readily accept a solution that makes it better. But again, most people find it easier to complain about something than it is to find a way to fix it, so they do nothing. A strong organization finds ways to turn those complaints into actions.