Start with the problem. Not the solution.

ENGAGE

Get close to the work.

We listen to leaders, frontline employees and others connected to the work. What are they seeing? What are they experiencing? What gets in the way? What is already helping?

Good diagnosis begins with honest conversation, observation and genuine curiosity.

DIAGNOSE

Look at the whole system.

Performance does not happen in isolation. We look at three connected parts of the work:

People

The people doing the work — their skills, capabilities, relationships, leadership, communication and experience.

Environment

Where and how the work happens — physical space, workflow, technology, operating conditions and the connections among them.

Inputs

What people are given to work with — tools, training, information, equipment, products, materials, supplies and other resources.

A performance problem may be a skills issue. A training problem may actually be an equipment or workflow problem. A retention problem may be connected to leadership or the environment. Often several factors interact.

Our job is to understand the friction before deciding how to remove it.

CONNECT

Bring together what the problem actually requires.

No single person sees the whole system. Frontline employees have proximity to the work. Leaders have context and responsibility. Outside specialists can bring expertise and fresh eyes.

CONNECT means bringing together the knowledge, perspectives and capabilities the problem requires — inside and outside the organization — and keeping those pieces coherent as the work moves forward.

Expertise matters. So does proximity. The strongest solutions often require both.

CREATE

Build a practical path forward.

The answer may be an operating change, focused experiment, workshop, learning resource, leadership tool, technology, specialist capability, market approach or a combination of several pieces.

Whatever the form, it has to make sense in the real environment where people will use it.

A solution has to work where the work happens.

What a Sylva diagnostic looks like

A diagnostic is not a predetermined product or a report written from a distance. It may include conversations with leadership and frontline team members, observation of the work, review of workflows, tools, training, equipment and information, and comparison of what different parts of the system are experiencing.

The goal is not to catalogue everything. It is to understand what is creating friction, what matters most and what the organization should do next.

Solve with people, not merely for them.

The people experiencing the work should participate in understanding and improving it. Better decisions emerge when frontline knowledge, leadership context and relevant expertise can be heard and connected.