"Reset": A Guide to Finding What Works and Fixing What Doesn't
Dan Heath's "Reset" Offers a Powerful Toolkit for Identifying Leverage Points and Restacking Resources for Effective Change
When progress stalls, it doesn’t just slow you down — it can start to corrode your self-image. In high-stakes environments like building a new product or scaling a venture, this “failure to thrive” feeling can be devastating. Over time, the belief that you’re simply “not capable of making progress” can creep in, quietly choking innovation and crushing growth.
For product and company builders, feeling stuck often looks like:
Stalled product development: Features aren’t shipping, user adoption plateaus, or the product no longer fits the market.
Ineffective strategies: Marketing flops, sales flatline, or the business model feels shaky.
Internal roadblocks: Morale dips, processes bog down, and resistance to change hardens.
Enter bestselling author Dan Heath — the mind behind classics like Made to Stick, Switch, The Power of Moments, and Upstream (my personal favorite) . In his latest book, Reset: How to Change What's Not Working, Heath tackles one of the toughest challenges of all: how to escape the feeling of being stuck when meaningful progress seems out of reach.
Drawing from a blend of sharp research and vivid real-world stories (like how a hospital overhauled its chaotic receiving system), Heath introduces a powerful two-part approach: Find Leverage Points and Restack Resources.
The goal isn’t to push harder — it’s to intervene smarter, spotting the crucial pressure points and realigning what you already have to unlock real movement.
This review offers a deep dive into the key concepts from the book, starting with a detailed case study of how Northwestern Memorial Hospital transformed a dysfunctional receiving system into a high-performing operation. It introduces Heath’s two-part framework for change: Finding Leverage Points and Restacking Resources.
The post also addresses criticisms and counterarguments, acknowledging the challenges of applying these methods in complex real-world systems. Finally, it offers case studies applying the framework to issues like declining user engagement in a social media app and low conversion rates in e-commerce, and wraps up with a practical checklist to help readers apply the Reset framework step-by-step.
1. The Northwestern Memorial Hospital Story
The problem at the Northwestern Memorial Hospital receiving area was characterized by a highly inefficient and unreliable package delivery system.
Here's a breakdown of the issues:
Significant Delays: In 2016, it took an average of three days for packages to get from the receiving area to their destination within the hospital. This meant that medications flown across the country in a single day could take three more days to reach a nurse on a different floor of the same building.
Unpredictable Delivery Times: The delays were not consistent; the wait time could vary from one to five days. This unpredictability made it impossible for hospital staff to plan effectively or build in buffer times.
Constant Inquiries: A red phone in the receiving area rang constantly with nurses and staff inquiring about the whereabouts of their packages, ordered days prior. This indicates a lack of visibility and trust in the delivery process.
Hoarders' Attic Appearance: The receiving area itself was disorganized and looked like a "hoarder's attic," making it difficult to locate packages.
Severe Consequences: The delays had significant negative impacts:
Spoiled Medications: Refrigerated medicines would sometimes spoil while still in their boxes.
Increased Expenses: Staff would reorder items they feared were lost, often using expedited shipping, leading to higher costs.
Inaccurate Inventory: To avoid the delays, people started having packages delivered directly to their departments, making it impossible to maintain an accurate inventory system.
Perceived Normalcy of Dysfunction: The system had been dysfunctional for so long that the delays had come to seem like the normal state of affairs. People assumed that a three-day delivery time was just the way things were.
Feeling Stuck and Defeated: The receiving area team felt stuck and was considered the "pariahs of the hospital". The inability to improve the situation led to a defeatist mentality.
Paul Suett was hired as the hospital’s supply chain performance manager in 2016 with the specific goal of "restoring sanity to the receiving area". He recognized that the existing system was designed to deliver packages in three days. For meaningful change to occur, the need for improvement had to become obvious not only to him but also to his team members.
To tackle the problem, Suett focused on deeply understanding the current system and empowering his team to lead improvements. His strategy unfolded in the following key steps:
Recognizing the "Stuck" Mentality and Aiming for a Different Result: Suett understood that the receiving area team was "stuck" with a "defeatist mentality". He aimed to show them "another way" to succeed by getting them to rethink their work. He operated under the principle that "every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets," meaning that to achieve different results (like one-day delivery instead of three), the existing system needed to change.
Gaining Team Buy-in: Instead of dictating changes, Suett asked his team, "If I can show you how to simplify your work—and make it easier on you—then will you come along on the journey with me?" This helped gain their initial agreement to listen and participate. He also showed he was listening by immediately addressing one of their complaints: the jammed wheels on their carts, by agreeing to buy new ones.
Setting a New Aspiration: Suett challenged the department to reach a new goal of delivering packages within one day of arrival, framing it as what their internal "customers" in the hospital would want and what they needed to provide.
Identifying and Eliminating "Waste" through Observation: Suett invited his team to help him diagnose the "waste" in the system, defining it as any activity that didn't add value for the customer. They realized that every time the red phone rang with inquiries about packages, it was waste because their internal customers shouldn't have to call. To further understand the process, for 12 business days, they spent one hour "walking the process" from end to end, noting problems and asking questions.
Visualizing Inefficiencies: Suett filmed the team's operations and showed them clips, comparing it to a coach reviewing game film, to highlight inefficiencies they might not have noticed. For instance, they saw a worker picking up a box five different times before processing it, emphasizing the hidden costs of such unnecessary steps.
Analyzing Value-Added Work: By analyzing their own work, the team discovered that only 38% of their time spent processing packages was actually "adding value" for their customers, with the rest being waste. This realization spurred them to rebuild the process.
Moving Away from Inefficient Batching: A fundamental change was moving away from "batching" packages, where a single operation would be performed on a pile of packages before moving on. Suett demonstrated the inefficiency of batching compared to a continuous flow process using a sticky note exercise, which was an "eye opener" for the staff.
Implementing Continuous Flow: Following the demonstration, the team began overhauling the batch processes, eliminating unnecessary steps, and moving toward a more continuous operation, guided by Suett’s mantra: "Keep the river flowing".
Achieving Rapid Results: Within six weeks of implementing these changes, the "unthinkable had happened": 90% of the hospital locations were receiving daily deliveries. This visible progress had ripple effects throughout the hospital, increasing trust and changing behaviors related to ordering and inventory.
Ultimately, Suett's success stemmed from his ability to engage his team in identifying and solving the problems themselves, rather than imposing solutions from above. He focused on making the inefficiencies visible and demonstrating the value of change through practical exercises and by addressing their immediate concerns. The resulting progress then fueled further enthusiasm and transformation within the department.
2. Finding Leverage Points
The book outlines a framework for change, which begins with finding Leverage Points and then restacking resources to push on those points. Leverage Points are defined as interventions where a small amount of effort yields disproportionate returns. The book emphasizes that due to the complexity of situations, you can't change everything, or even most things, but by identifying and focusing on a well-chosen Leverage Point, you can initiate significant change.
The first section of the book details five methods for locating these "magical Leverage Points":
Go and see the work: This method involves observing up close the reality of your work. By getting out of conference rooms and into the "medium of reality," you can uncover problems and potential interventions that you might otherwise be oblivious to due to habit or assumptions.
Example: Assistant Principal Karen Ritter shadowed a ninth-grader for a day to understand how the school could better serve its students, uncovering hard truths about the student experience.
Example: The president of a paper plant discovered that a corrugating machine was being shut down daily due to an energy problem that had been resolved years earlier, simply by observing the work.
Turnaround consultants also use this method by walking the halls and observing production lines, often going straight to the front lines to understand what's really happening.
Consider the goal of the goal: This method involves identifying alternate pathways to your ultimate destination by looking beyond immediate objectives. It encourages asking the question, "What's the goal of the goal?" to avoid misdirected efforts that achieve targets but fail the overall mission.
Example: Stellantis's goal was to create a great car-buying experience, leading to the shorter-term goal of boosting customer satisfaction scores. However, the intense focus on survey scores led to manipulative tactics by the dealership, highlighting a misalignment with the real mission. Asking "what's the goal of the goal?" would have shifted the focus to the underlying desire for happy customers.
Example: Government leaders initially aimed to make it easier for disabled veterans to apply for student loan forgiveness. By considering the goal of the goal – to improve their financial security – they realized an alternate pathway: proactively forgiving the loans.
The Miracle Question ("Suppose a miracle happens tonight while you're sleeping and this problem you have is solved...") can also help identify first productive steps towards the desired outcome, revealing potential Leverage Points.
Study the bright spots: This method involves analyzing your own best work or instances of unusual success within the context of your goal. By untangling averages and focusing on these "bright spots," you can identify what's working well and replicate those conditions or behaviors.
Example: At Gartner, facing a drop in customer retention, Ken Davis studied the client partners who had achieved 100% or better retention during the recession. He identified specific behaviors they used, like a "defined daily process," which became Leverage Points to direct the whole team toward.
Example: Kate Hurley, working with animal shelters, identified the "return to field" practice in Jacksonville as a bright spot for reducing euthanasia rates, and this became a critical Leverage Point adopted by other shelters.
Target the constraint: This method involves assessing the #1 force that is holding you back from improving your work or scaling your efforts. The "constraint" or "bottleneck" is the limiting factor, and Leverage Points in this case are interventions that erode these obstacles.
Example: Chick-fil-A focused on the constraint of drive-thru efficiency. A key early Leverage Point was the adoption of "face-to-face ordering" to speed up the process. Later, they identified another constraint when lines spilled onto the street, leading to the Leverage Point of "closing the gaps" by having order takers walk alongside moving cars.
In a home-care business, the constraint was labor quality and retention. Leverage Points to relieve this constraint included a tough hiring process and a mentorship program.
Shifting your goal can also shift the constraint, requiring you to target a different limiting factor.
Map the system: This method involves rising above the silos within or across organizations to see the big picture and spot "hidden levers". Understanding how all the pieces fit together can reveal unexpected points of intervention.
Example: Geordie Brackin and Mike Goldstein, focused on helping low-income college graduates achieve financial security, initially believed the solution lay solely within education. By mapping the system of a student's journey through school and into the job market, they realized a promising Leverage Point was to intervene during the job search itself with "high-dosage career tutoring".
By following the patient journey in a radiology clinic, staff members identified Leverage Points like having the receptionist administer contrast upon check-in, eliminating a two-week wait time.
Challenging assumptions is a crucial component of mapping the system, as assumptions often drive how you view the system and can mask potential Leverage Points. For instance, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) challenged the assumption that reducing methane emissions wasn't critical in the long run, uncovering a "hidden lever" in climate change efforts.
By employing these five methods, one can systematically search for and identify Leverage Points – those crucial interventions that can lead to significant and positive change with focused effort. Once identified, the next step is to "Restack Resources" to effectively act upon these points.
3. Restacking Resources
Once Leverage Points have been identified, the next crucial step in the framework for change is Restacking Resources. This involves aligning your existing assets – such as time, money, enthusiasm, and processes – so that they collectively push on those identified Leverage Points. The fundamental principle here is often thinking "INSTEAD OF" rather than "AND," meaning you'll likely need to draw resources from existing activities to fuel your efforts at the Leverage Point. This often involves making trade-offs.
The second section of the book details six strategies for Restacking Resources:
Start with a burst: This method involves beginning with an intense and focused period of work dedicated to the goal related to the Leverage Point. This can help overcome inertia, similar to how more force is needed to dislodge a stuck window than to keep it moving.
The radiology clinic's five-day effort to make significant improvements by having the receptionist administer contrast and reconfiguring the workflow is a prime example of a burst. This allowed them to bypass typical bureaucratic delays and collaborate in real-time.
Bursts can be an antidote to the harms of "task switching," which involves inefficient transitions between activities that make us slower, less effective, more prone to errors, and more stressed. By providing a block of focused time, bursts help maintain momentum.
The turnaround team at ExxonMobil's Technical Data Center used a burst to tackle a backlog of unarchived files, leading to a visible initial achievement that boosted morale and generated further energy.
Even in remote work, the principle of rowing in sync can be honored through "bursty communication," where teams have certain hours for real-time collaboration.
Recycle waste: This strategy focuses on discontinuing efforts that don’t add value in the customer’s eyes. Identifying and eliminating such "waste" provides a "free lunch" of resources – money, energy, labor, materials – that can be immediately redirected to push on Leverage Points without painful trade-offs.
The City of Asheboro's use of technology to optimize bulk trash truck routes, saving fuel, is an example of recycling waste because citizens didn't value the specific routes taken.
The DOWNTIME framework (Defects, Overproduction, Waiting, Nonutilized talent, Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Excess processing) can help identify different categories of waste. The Northwestern Memorial Hospital receiving area turnaround involved a DOWNTIME analysis.
In non-factory environments, a key area of waste is "nonutilized talent," where people are playing below their level. "Shifting right" involves clearing lower-value activities from people's schedules to free them up for higher-value ones where their unique skills are needed, as Gary Kaplan did at AXA XL.
The hospital receiving area's reduction in red phone calls ("Where’s my package?") is an example of recycling waste by eliminating a non-value-added activity.
Do less AND more: This involves a core trade-off: shifting effort from lower-value work to higher-value work. This often requires a conscious decision to stop or do less of certain things to enable doing more of what truly matters for the Leverage Point.
Rosa, trying to improve her family's chaotic mornings, chose to go to bed earlier (less evening time with her husband) to have more calm and patience in the morning (more positive interaction with her children) .
Strategex uses a Pareto-inspired (80/20) analysis to identify overcoddled customers who receive disproportionate resources and undercoddled customers who could generate more profit with better service, advocating for shifting resources from the former to the latter.
A simple exercise to facilitate this involves filling in four quadrants: STOP, START, LESS, MORE, helping teams identify areas for resource reallocation.
Art Mollenhauer's turnaround of Big Brothers Big Sisters involved both significant cuts (STOP/LESS – to programs, staff, and board members) and strategic investments (START/MORE – a board retreat, a corporate partnership manager), demonstrating the importance of both aspects. Research suggests that blending cuts and investments is the best strategy during challenging times like recessions.
Tap motivation: This strategy focuses on prioritizing work that is both required and desired by the people involved. Motivation is a crucial but often untapped resource. Instead of trying to force "buy-in" for unpopular changes, it's more effective to go where the energy is and harness existing enthusiasm.
Ezra Fox tapped his children's natural interest in games to motivate them to clean up their toys. Dr. Doug Eby connected better self-care to his diabetic patient's desire to hunt and fish with his grandkids, aligning the required action with the patient's values.
Finding the intersection of "what’s required" for success and "what’s desired" by individuals or teams is key.
The "genius swap" idea involves trading responsibilities based on interest to better align tasks with individual passions, unleashing motivation.
Dianne Connery revitalized the Pottsboro Library by tapping into the enthusiasm of community members for meaningful programs, demonstrating the "waterfall approach" of channeling natural energy to do work. Recognizing and celebrating progress is also crucial for sustaining motivation.
Let people drive: This involves giving your team the autonomy to own the change effort. This approach is motivating, instills accountability, taps higher-order skills, and reduces waste from micromanagement.
Richard Gibney's allowing kidney dialysis patients to perform self-dialysis yielded strikingly positive results, highlighting that "the least utilized resource in medicine is the patient".
The concept of "aligned autonomy" is key, where management provides the direction ("cross the river") but empowers the team to figure out the "how". This is seen in Spotify's approach.
T-Mobile's transformation of its call centers through the Team of Experts (TEX) model involved giving employees more ownership over their work, recycling waste by resolving issues on the first call, and accelerating learning by sharing information effectively.
Accelerate learning: This final strategy for restacking resources focuses on getting better, faster feedback to fuel improvements. By quickly identifying what's working and what's not, you can make timely adjustments and recalibrate your efforts, which inherently reduces waste.
The San Francisco 49ers' use of HappyOrNot terminals provided real-time feedback on fan satisfaction, allowing staff to address issues during games rather than waiting for post-game surveys, significantly shrinking the lag time for identifying problems. This also allowed them to deploy their staff more effectively, reducing wasted effort.
Faster learning doesn't always require more data or technology; sometimes, it involves seeking out feedback from the people best equipped to provide it.
NPR's Eric Nuzum shifted from trying to predict the best show concept to testing multiple ideas simultaneously, allowing for quicker learning about what resonated with audiences.
The framework of Finding Leverage Points and Restacking Resources is often iterative, where you push on a priority, learn from the results, and then refine your approach or identify better priorities.
By applying these six strategies, organizations and individuals can effectively Restack Resources onto their Leverage Points, generating the necessary force to overcome inertia and achieve significant change. The story of Hospital Sírio-Libanês, where they improved employee engagement by addressing their frustrations and empowering them to find solutions, serves as a comprehensive example of both finding a Leverage Point (participative management) and restacking resources through tapping motivation and other strategies. Ultimately, successfully restacking resources leads to progress, which in itself can be a powerful motivator.
4. Critics and Counterarguments
While Reset lays out practical methods for finding Leverage Points — such as observing work, reconsidering goals, studying successes, targeting constraints, and mapping systems — critics argue these strategies have real-world limitations. Observations can be subjective, goals may be oversimplified, success factors are not always replicable, constraints can shift unpredictably, and system mapping often proves more complex than anticipated.
Similarly, the book’s Restack Resources strategies — like initiating bursts of work, recycling waste, doing less and more, tapping motivation, empowering teams, and accelerating learning — may encounter challenges around sustainability, subjective definitions of waste, tough trade-offs, motivational gaps, misaligned autonomy, and short-term thinking overriding strategic depth.
4.1 Counterarguments to Finding Leverage Points
Subjectivity in “Go and See the Work”: Observing work firsthand can reveal blind spots, but interpretations can be highly subjective. Surface-level insights may miss systemic issues, as the “illusion of explanatory depth” reminds us.
Risks in “Consider the Goal of the Goal”: While questioning ultimate aims can unlock insight, it risks distracting teams from immediate, necessary objectives — sometimes creating misalignments, as seen in the car dealership survey score fiasco.
Limits of “Study the Bright Spots”: Replicating success isn’t always simple. Context matters. Bright spots like “return to field” programs in shelters faced controversies and unintended consequences, suggesting successes aren’t always one-size-fits-all.
Complexity in “Target the Constraint”: Identifying the true constraint in complex systems is difficult. Constraints can shift, and misidentifying them can waste precious resources and effort.
Challenges in “Map the System”: System mapping can uncover hidden levers, but fully understanding complex systems requires major effort and often revisiting assumptions — as seen in efforts to improve job outcomes for low-income grads.
4.2 Counterarguments to Restacking Resources
Sustainability of “Start with a Burst”: Bursts create initial momentum but can risk burnout if not transitioned into sustainable rhythms.
Defining “Waste” in “Recycle Waste”: Labeling activities as waste can be contentious — some overhead work may quietly support morale, creativity, or long-term resilience.
Trade-offs in “Do Less AND More”: Choosing what to deprioritize can be politically painful and culturally resisted, even when logically sound.
Limits of “Tap Motivation”: Not all critical work is inherently motivating. Real change often requires tackling necessary but less appealing tasks.
Risks of “Let People Drive”: Empowering teams sounds great, but without aligned autonomy, it risks fragmentation and inefficiency.
Pitfalls of “Accelerate Learning”: Rapid iteration can spur agility, but without strategic anchoring, it may prioritize short-term wins over sustainable growth.
In short, while Reset offers an appealing framework for getting unstuck, real-world application may run up against complexity, shifting systems, resistance, and trade-offs that require deeper navigation than the book sometimes acknowledges.
5. Case Studies Applying Reset Framework
Here are two illustrative examples of how product or company builders can tackle persistent challenges by identifying leverage points and strategically restacking resources:
5.1 Example: Declining User Engagement in a Social Media App
The Stuck Problem: A social media app is experiencing a consistent decline in daily and monthly active users and a decrease in the average time spent in the app. Initial feature additions haven't reversed this trend.
1. Find Leverage Points:
Go and See the Work: The product team analyzes user behavior data closely. They observe user drop-off points, which features are least used, and where users seem to get stuck or frustrated. They might also conduct user interviews or surveys to understand why people are using the app less. Let's say they discover a significant drop-off during the onboarding process and low engagement with a recently launched "groups" feature.
Consider the Goal of the Goal: The app's goal is to connect people and foster interaction. The decline in engagement suggests they are failing to achieve this underlying purpose. The "goal of the goal" might be to create meaningful connections and provide value that keeps users returning. Perhaps the current features aren't effectively facilitating these connections.
Study the Bright Spots: The team identifies a small segment of "power users" who remain highly engaged. They analyze the behavior of these users – what features do they use most? What kind of content do they create and interact with? Perhaps these users heavily rely on direct messaging and sharing specific types of content that resonate within smaller circles.
Target the Constraint: The analysis suggests that the friction in the onboarding process is a major constraint, preventing new users from experiencing the app's core value. Additionally, the "groups" feature, intended to boost engagement, isn't resonating, potentially due to a lack of clear purpose or difficult usability.
Map the System: The team maps the user journey from initial download to daily interaction. They identify the key stages, potential pain points, and where engagement drops off. This visual representation highlights the leaky onboarding funnel and the underutilized "groups" feature.
2. Restack Resources:
Start with a Burst: The team dedicates a focused two-week sprint to overhaul the onboarding flow based on user feedback and best practices. They might simplify the registration process, provide clearer tutorials on key features (like direct messaging and the types of content favored by bright spots), and personalize the initial content feed.
Recycle Waste: They decide to temporarily pause development on other less critical features and re-evaluate the underperforming "groups" feature based on user feedback. Resources allocated to maintaining and promoting the current "groups" feature are freed up.
Do Less AND More: Instead of trying to force adoption of the existing "groups" feature (doing less of what isn't working), they invest more in improving the core direct messaging functionality and explore incorporating features favored by their "bright spot" users, such as enhanced content sharing tools within smaller, more intimate circles.
Tap Motivation: They involve their engaged "power users" in beta-testing the new onboarding flow and provide early access to enhanced direct messaging features, leveraging their enthusiasm and getting valuable feedback.
Let People Drive: The design and development teams are given more autonomy to experiment with different onboarding flows and iterate quickly based on user data. They are empowered to make decisions on how to best improve the user experience within the defined goals.
Accelerate Learning: They implement A/B testing on different aspects of the onboarding process and closely monitor key metrics (activation rate, first-week retention, direct message usage) to quickly identify what's working and what's not. They iterate rapidly based on these learnings.
5.2 Example: Low Conversion Rates on an E-commerce Website
The Stuck Problem: An e-commerce website has a high volume of traffic but a consistently low conversion rate (percentage of visitors who make a purchase). Marketing efforts to drive more traffic aren't significantly increasing sales.
1. Find Leverage Points:
Go and See the Work: The team analyzes website analytics, paying close attention to the user journey from landing page to checkout. They observe high cart abandonment rates and users spending a lot of time on product pages but not adding items to their cart. They might also use heatmaps and session recordings to see how users interact with the site.
Consider the Goal of the Goal: The primary goal is to sell products. The low conversion rate indicates a disconnect between attracting visitors and completing sales. The "goal of the goal" is to provide a seamless and trustworthy shopping experience that encourages purchases. Perhaps the current website design or checkout process is hindering this.
Study the Bright Spots: They look at products with unusually high conversion rates. What makes these product pages different? Perhaps they have more detailed descriptions, higher-quality images, or more positive customer reviews prominently displayed. They might also analyze the behavior of customers who do complete purchases – what paths do they take? What information do they seek?
Target the Constraint: The high cart abandonment rate suggests that the checkout process is a major constraint. Additionally, a lack of sufficient information or trust on product pages might be preventing users from adding items to their cart in the first place.
Map the System: The team maps the customer's buying journey, from initial search to post-purchase experience. They identify potential friction points at each stage, particularly on product pages and during checkout.
2. Restack Resources:
Start with a Burst: The team dedicates a week-long design sprint focused solely on simplifying and optimizing the checkout process. They might reduce the number of steps, offer guest checkout options, provide clearer shipping cost information upfront, and enhance security assurances.
Recycle Waste: They might temporarily reduce investment in broad marketing campaigns that are driving unqualified traffic and focus instead on optimizing the website for better conversion of existing traffic. Resources spent on overly complex website features that aren't directly contributing to sales could be reallocated.
Do Less AND More: Instead of overwhelming users with excessive product information or complex navigation (doing less), they invest more in high-quality product photography, detailed and benefit-oriented descriptions, and prominently displayed customer reviews and ratings.
Tap Motivation: They might offer small incentives (e.g., a discount code for completing the checkout) to users who have abandoned their carts, encouraging them to finalize their purchase. They could also solicit feedback from customers who abandoned carts to understand their reasons.
Let People Drive: The web development and design teams are empowered to make quick changes to the checkout process based on analytics and user feedback. They are given the autonomy to experiment with different layouts and information presentation.
Accelerate Learning: They implement A/B tests on different elements of the product pages (e.g., placement of reviews, call-to-action buttons) and the checkout flow (e.g., form field order, payment options) to quickly determine what changes lead to higher conversion rates.
These examples demonstrate how the "Find Leverage Points and Restack Resources" framework can be applied to real-world business problems by systematically identifying key areas for intervention and strategically reallocating existing resources to drive meaningful change.
6. Checklist for Applying Reset Framework
Part 1: Finding Leverage Points
This section involves the essential detective work to identify where small investments can yield big returns. Consider the following five methods:
Go and see the work:
Observe your work (or the process you want to change) up close and personally. As Nelson Repenning says, "Go and see the work".
If it's a service or experience, follow the journey of a customer, patient, or student. For example, Assistant Principal Karen Ritter shadowed a student.
Look for problems you might have become oblivious to or acclimated to.
For knowledge work, map out the flow of activities to make it tangible.
Talk to the people doing the work; they often know what’s going on.
Ask yourself: What did you observe that surprised you? Where are the bottlenecks or points of friction?
Consider the goal of the goal:
Clarify your ultimate destination and why it's truly important. Ask yourself: "What's the goal of the goal?".
Identify alternate pathways to achieving that ultimate goal. The Department of Education shifted from easing application to proactively forgiving loans.
Use the Miracle Question: "Imagine that in the middle of the night tonight, as you are sleeping, a miracle happens… the problem you are stressed about has been solved. Poof! Gone. But the miracle happened when you were sleeping, so when you first wake up, you have no way of knowing it happened. What are the first things you notice?". Focus on tangible signs.
Ask yourself: Are we focused on the right metrics? What is the true intent behind our current goals? What other ways could we achieve the desired outcome?
Study the bright spots:
Analyze your own successes—the times you were at your best in the context of your goal. These are your "bright spots". Ken Davis at Gartner studied successful client partners.
Push beyond averages and disaggregate your data to see individual performance. The air force realized there was no "average pilot".
Identify the circumstances that allowed for those successes.
Think about how you can replicate and scale those successful circumstances. Kate Hurley identified "return to field" as a bright spot in animal shelters.
Ask yourself: When have we been most successful? What was different about those situations? How can we do more of what works?
Target the constraint:
Identify the #1 thing (the "constraint" or "bottleneck") that is holding you back from your goal. Chick-fil-A targeted the flow in their drive-thru.
Observe your work to spot blockages, pileups, or delays.
Ask yourself: If you could hire one person to help you achieve your goal, what would their role be? This role might be the epicenter of the constraint.
Consider how easing this constraint could lead to disproportionate progress.
Remember that constraints are contingent on the goal. If the goal shifts, the constraint might shift too.
Ask yourself: What is the biggest obstacle in our way? If we could remove one thing, what would have the biggest impact?
Map the system:
Zoom out to see the big picture and how all the pieces fit together.
Rise above the silos within and across organizations. Follow the journey of a customer across different departments. The radiology clinic mapped the patient journey.
Challenge your assumptions about why things are done a certain way. Geordie Brackin and Mike Goldstein questioned the assumption that a college degree guaranteed financial security for low-income students.
Look for the "hidden levers"—promising targets for action within the system.
Ask yourself: How do different parts of our organization or ecosystem interact? What are the underlying assumptions driving our current processes? Where could a small change have a ripple effect?
Part 2: Restacking Resources
Once you have identified promising Leverage Points, the next step is to strategically realign your existing resources (time, money, enthusiasm, processes, etc.) to focus on those points. Here are six strategies for marshalling resources while minimizing the sting of trade-offs:
Start with a burst:
Begin with an intense and focused period of work directed at your Leverage Point.
Protect your team's focus and give them the gift of unbroken time. This helps overcome "time confetti" and task switching. ExxonMobil's Technical Data Center used bursts to tackle their backlog.
Aim for quick wins to build momentum.
Ask yourself: Where can we dedicate a concentrated effort to jumpstart progress on our Leverage Point? How can we minimize distractions during this period?
Recycle waste:
Identify and discontinue efforts that don’t add value for the customer (or your ultimate goal). This is "waste".
Use the DOWNTIME framework to help identify different types of waste: Defects, Overproduction, Waiting, Nonutilized talent, Transportation, Inventory, Motion, Excess processing. The hospital receiving area realized the red phone was a form of waste.
Look for "nonutilized talent"—areas where people's skills and enthusiasm aren't being fully leveraged.
Ask yourself: What activities are we currently doing that our customers don't value or that don't contribute to our key goals? Where are we wasting time, effort, or resources?
Do less AND more:
Shift resources away from lower-value work to higher-value activities that align with your Leverage Points.
Use a STOP, START, MORE, LESS quadrant to visualize where to increase and decrease efforts.
Apply the Pareto principle (80/20 rule) to identify the vital few activities that drive the majority of results. Strategex used this to focus on profitable customers.
Consider where you might be "overcoddling" certain areas or customers.
Ask yourself: What are our low-impact activities that we can reduce or eliminate? Where should we be investing more of our time and energy for greater impact?
Tap motivation:
Prioritize the work that is both required and desired by your team or constituents. Go where the energy is. Ezra Fox tapped into his kids' interest in games to get them to clean up.
Consider a "genius swap"—identifying tasks people dislike and swapping them with tasks others are excited to do.
Actively seek to understand people's interests and values and align the change with those.
Recognize and celebrate progress to sustain motivation. Frank Blake at Home Depot stressed the importance of customer service and recognized associates who excelled.
Ask yourself: What are our people naturally enthusiastic about? How can we connect our Leverage Points to their intrinsic motivation? How can we recognize and reward progress?
Let people drive:
Give your team the autonomy to lead the change efforts within clear boundaries.
Strive for high autonomy and high alignment, where leaders focus on what problems to solve, but let the teams figure out how to solve them (the Spotify model).
Provide support and a safety net to enable autonomy. The T-Mobile TEX model gave call center employees ownership over specific customer relationships.
Ask yourself: How can we empower our team members to take ownership of the change? What level of autonomy can we provide while ensuring we are still aligned on our goals?
Accelerate learning:
Focus on how quickly you can identify failure or whether your efforts are working. The San Francisco 49ers used real-time data to address fan issues quickly.
Seek out better, faster feedback loops to guide your work.
Use data and evidence to learn and adapt quickly.
Don't just rely on more data; seek out the people best equipped to give feedback.
Consider testing multiple approaches simultaneously to see what works best (like planting multiple seeds, as NPR did with new show concepts).
Ask yourself: How quickly can we know if our changes are having the desired effect? What are our feedback mechanisms? How can we experiment and learn rapidly?
By working through this checklist, you can systematically apply the framework presented in "Reset" to identify where to focus your efforts and how to realign your resources to achieve meaningful and lasting change. Remember that this is often an iterative process.