As product leaders, our job isn’t just to solve problems. It’s to solve the right problem in the right way. This 7-step framework has helped me unlock untapped growth in the products I’ve worked on, hence delivering meaningful, lasting impact for the business. To bring it to life, let’s rewind to when I was at Uber and used it to 6x the conversion rate in one of our cities.

The context: Launched two cities, one lagged behind

More than a decade ago, Uber was expanding fast. I was leading local marketing, and we launched in two Romanian cities simultaneously. A few weeks in, one was booming. The other? Crickets.

The pressure was on: either double down on top-of-funnel marketing or pull the plug. I wasn’t convinced more awareness would fix the problem, but I definitely wasn’t ready to give up. So I turned to the 7-step framework I still use today.

Step 1: Understand the problem you’re trying to solve

Seems obvious, right? But too often we jump to conclusions and tackle the perceived problem, not the real one. At a first glance, our issue was growth. But once I dug into the data, the story shifted. In fact, we were acquiring more riders at a lower acquisition cost than forecasted. The real bottleneck was further down the funnel. Conversions. Specifically, our signup-to-first trip conversion rate was the lowest Uber had ever seen. We didn’t have a top-of-funnel issue. We had a leaky bucket. And this was our real problem to solve.

Step 2. Set clear objectives

To avoid ambiguity later, define what success looks like, early and precisely. In doing so, you avoid the grueling situation where different stakeholders have different opinions on whether the problem has been solved or not. In our case, we aligned on a clear objective right from the start: 3x the conversion rate. It wouldn’t make us a top-performing city, but it would keep us in the game.

More importantly: we focused on one metric only. No distractions. Adding multiple objectives would have created the 3-body problem (as explained by Dharmesh Shah here) and left too much room for debate.

Step 3: Identify the root cause of the problem

Treat the symptoms, not the underlying disease, and you risk killing the patient. Not as dramatic as in medicine, but there’s definitely a risk to kill an otherwise great product. Identifying the root cause of the problem is essential, and yet it’s here where most teams default to “solutionising”: throwing ideas at the wall, hoping something sticks.

Our initial proposed solution was to incentivize new customers to take their first rides. This would have probably worked. At least temporarily. But it would have definitely not solved the problem in the long-term, in a sustainable way for the business. 

So we got back to the drawing board and dived deep to understand the real cause of the problem. Instead of making uneducated assumptions (to be read guesses), we decided to go right to the source: we talked to our customers. First, we sent a survey to all the customers what hadn’t taken a ride. We gathered quantitative data that we further validated through focus groups and customer interviews. The results were surprising. The top reason people weren’t taking their first trip? They didn’t have a credit card to use in the app. Yes, really. It was mind-blowing for us to understand this.

Step 4: Widening phase: generate alternative solutions

Now came the fun part: brainstorming. We generated potential solutions in a brainstorming process that is very similar to what the decision-making literature calls the “widening phase”. We brought together product, marketing, ops, and comms, to surface all ideas: the good, the bad, and the bold. At this point, there is no such thing as a bad idea. Two hours later, we had 10 solid options to solve our problem.

Step 5: Narrowing it down to solutions

As the problem owner, I made the final call of which solutions to actually deploy. In doing so, I evaluated all our potential solutions using the ICE framework (Impact, Confidence, Ease). There are more complex frameworks out there For a more elaborated prioritization framework, check out the “Introducing DRICE: a modern prioritization framework” in Lenny’s Newsletter.

At this stage it’s very important own the decision. The problem owner makes the final call. Consensus is not the goal: clarity and speed are. I communicated the rationale transparently, such that the team was able to “disagree and commit”, hence avoiding the situation where team members are advocating for their own proposals vs. the best solutions for the problem.

Step 6: Execute (flawlessly)

What makes the difference between success and failure in solving the problem is the effective implementation of the chosen solution(s). After narrowing down the initial proposals, we decided to move ahead with two intertwined solutions:

• The quick win: educating customers on the safety of credit card payments via owned, earned and paid channels. In doing so, we partnered with a local bank that offered a preferential deal to Uber riders in the city and the promise of getting a credit card quickly.
• The big bet: launching cash to drive credit-card adoption. Yes, you read that one right – we decided to make a bold move. We launched cash as a payment method, all while extending our local bank partnership to offer 5 free rides to customers that started paying in cash and then switched to credit-card payments

Execution was crisp. Bias-to-action was high. Everyone pulled in the same direction.

Step 7: Assess, Measure, Adapt

The last (but not necessarily final) step in the decision making framework is to assess the results. You should do this frequently over the implementation period in order to check whether you are on track to deliver the intended results. If things derail, you need to add more potential solutions to the mix (see step 5 – the narrowing stage) or get back to the drawing board (see step 4 – the widening phase). 

We tracked results weekly. The quick win doubled the conversion rate in one month. The big bet? It 3x’d that number. In total, we achieved a 6x conversion rate increase, strong enough to keep growing the city, which is still thriving today, almost a decade later.

Key takeaways

Problem-solving isn’t just art. It’s repeatable science. When you aim to solve the right problems, make sure to:

• Validate assumptions with data
• Set clear, singular objectives
• Treat the underlying disease, not the symptoms
• Widen your solution space with diverse perspectives
• Take ownership when narrowing down
• Execute like your growth depends on it (because it does)
• Measure, learn, adapt

When you consistently solve the right problems, growth follows.