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COUNTY COMMENT %u2022 April 2025 7continuedRESOURCES AND EXECUTIONBy Jay Hall, KAC Deputy Director & General CounselWrapping up our three-part series on diagnosing problems. Remember, you can go back to February to read about diagnosing problems and addressing goal problems. In March, you can read up on strategic problems and communication problems. Truthfully, this is where a large portion of problems actually exist. Poor strategy and communication is often what betrays our success.This month, we look at the final two types of problems %u2013 Resource problems and Execution problems. As I said in February, many people believe every problem is simply an execution problem, and there is some truth to that. But that poor execution may not really be the root cause if the person did not know the goal, did not understand the plans, or was not told what was going on.The final hurdle to clear before looking at execution is resources. Simply put; in order to execute, you must be given the resources necessary to actually do the thing you are tasked with doing. Resources are the time, talent and materials minimally necessary to perform the assigned task. You cannot make a chicken dinner if you do not have chicken. That is not an execution problem. That is a resource problem. If you have a chicken and you make a bad chicken dinner, that is an execution problem. If you have a raw chicken, but you are only given five minutes to cook it, that is a resource problem. You may very well have the chicken, but without the time necessary to properly cook the chicken, you cannot perform the assigned task. That is a resource problem, not an execution one. Lack of time to finish a task is a lack of resources. Wasting time, however, is an execution problem. And therein lies the difference. Starting out without enough of something (time, talent, materials) is a resource problem. Squandering those resources and subsequently not having enough time, talent or material is an execution problem. Waste is about execution.To diagnose whether it is a resource or execution problem, you need to simply ask: %u201cCould anyone else have done the required task with the time, talent and materials allotted?%u201d If the answer is no, that is a resource problem and should be addressed as such. Either change the assigned task to match the available resources or change the available resources to match the assigned task.Only once you have established that the available resources are adequate to perform the assigned task can you move on to analyzing whether there was an execution problem. Execution problems only exist if you have eliminated the other types of problems. Is there a clear goal (i.e., does everyone know what we %u201c%u201d