'Cast your net widely': three steps to expanding and refining your problem before action learning application

This paper reflects upon a three-step process to expand the problem definition in the early stages of an action learning project. The process created a community-powered problem-solving approach within the action learning context. The simple three steps expanded upon in the paper create independence, dependence, and inter-dependence to aid the interaction of an action learning team as they uncovered the problem. The author recounts how his action learning project created steps of independence that captured divergent thoughts from throughout the organization; dependence that merged thoughts across the diverse group; and inter-dependence that built system thinking focused on horizontal impact across the organization. Readers can replicate the steps in future action learning projects to define the root cause problems before chasing the symptoms toward solutions. Project leaders who do not caste their nets widely during the problem definition stage may find their team solving the easy-to-catch symptoms.