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Framing the Problem 19

guesstimates about them?” We were figuring it out on the
back of an envelope, trying to be mostly right versus pre-
cisely wrong, and making some hypotheses from that. We
would say, “OK, if we assume that the market size is X,
what do we have to believe?”
Then the process became iterative: “We think the market

size is X, and if the market size is X, then Y must be true,” so
TEAMFLY
we went and looked at Y. As we started doing that, it
became much more apparent that we were on the right
track. We’re still struggling with the actual size of the mar-
ket, but we feel much more comfortable that we’ve done the
actual due diligence as it relates to tapping into any and
every resource we could think of.

Finally, an initial hypothesis saves you time by forcing you and
your team to focus only on those issues that can prove or disprove
it. This is especially helpful for those who have trouble focusing

and prioritizing. You may even know of a few such individuals in
your own organization.
An initial hypothesis will make your decision making more
effective. Not only does the hypothesis-driven approach make your
problem solving faster and more efficient, it allows you to assess
multiple options quickly. As a result, your decision making

becomes more flexible and therefore more effective. As CEO of a
brand-name consumer goods manufacturer, McKinsey alumnus
Bob Garda, now a member of the marketing faculty at the Fuqua
School of Business at Duke University, used a strong initial hypoth-
esis that went against his company’s conventional wisdom to turn
around its core business:

We were selling products that had been around for 20 years
and faced a lot of price pressure from Wal-Mart, Kmart, and
Target—our three biggest customers. They kept threatening

®
Team-Fly