Stop treating symptoms. The habit of "surface-fixing" is a fatal flaw in leadership, allowing the real problems in your business to fester and grow. This video is a deep dive into Root Cause Analysis (RCA), the essential framework for leaders who are tired of playing whack-a-mole with issues that refuse to die.

Discover the two critical systems for digging deeper. First, we unpack the legendary "Five Whys" method, the tool Toyota and SpaceX use to move beyond superficial answers and find the true source of a problem. Second, we explore the psychology behind our flawed reactions through Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), revealing how our core beliefs are often the real root cause of our struggles.

This is your guide to stop duct-taping radiators and start building a resilient, intelligent business from the ground up.

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Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00The Overheating Car: Why Symptom Fixing Fails

00:59 Ignoring Warning Signs

01:36 The Superficial Fix 'Game': Recognising Superficial Solutions

05:43 A Problem-Definition Test: If It's Obvious, It's a Symptom

06:59 The Wise Farmer: Nurturing the Roots

08:05 Introducing Solutions to Mental Traps

08:47 Intro to REBT: Albert Ellis & Challenging Irrational Beliefs

10:19 How Our Thinking Works

12:38 REBT Is Backed by Science with Data

13:35 Intro to RCA: Asking "Why?" Like a Toddler (and SpaceX)

15:55 The Power of 5 Whys (Toyota Example)

17:19 The Cost of Delay: 1-10-100 Rule in Action

18:12 RCA Toolkit Overview: 5 Whys, Ishikawa, FTA, FMEA etc.

18:49 Conclusion: Relentless Whys & Minimal 'Musturbation'

19:18 The Antikythera Mechanism - the Power of Digging Deeper

RCA QUICK TOUR

• Five Whys → Best for SPEED. Simple, quick fixes, linear problems.
• Ishikawa Diagram → Best for COMPLEXITY. Lots of suspects, one dead body.
• Fault Tree Analysis → Best for ENGINEERING. System failures, disaster prevention.
• Barrier Analysis → Best for SAFETY. Multiple safeguards breaking down.
• Apollo RCA → Best for BLAME-FREE cultures. Get into action.
• FMEA (Failure Mode Effects Analysis) → Best for FUTURE-PROOFING. A pre-mortem screw-ups prediction and prevention.

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

Every unexamined assumption is a potential blind spot leading to a strategic dead end. This video is a practical guide for leaders on how to challenge assumptions and uncover these blind spots *without* creating analysis paralysis or slowing your business down.

Discover a pragmatic framework for making critical thinking a habit, not a roadblock. We break down how to create psychological safety, use the 80/20 rule to focus only on high-stakes assumptions, and integrate powerful questioning into your existing workflows (strategy reviews, project kick-offs, and post-mortems). Learn how to normalise dissent by institutionalising roles like the 'Devil's Advocate' and the 'Toddler' to cut through corporate BS and get to the root of an issue.

This isn't about endless debate; it's about building a smarter, faster, and more resilient business.

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Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 Intro

00:08 Safety First, Creativity Second

00:38 Prioritising Problems to Question

01:26 Integrating Questioning into Daily Workflows

02:15 Welcoming Different Perspectives

02:50 Normalising Dissent & Curiosity

03:00 Hiring a Strategist

HOW TO QUESTION ASSUMPTIONS WITHOUT SLOWING DOWN

1. PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY

2. 80/20 PARETO PRINCIPLE

Not all assumptions carry equal weight. Some are foundational to your strategy, while others are minor operational details. The Pareto Principle (80/20 rule) often applies: roughly 80% of the potential negative impact comes from 20% of your unexamined assumptions.

3. IMPACT / UNCERTAINTY MATRIX

Mentally (or literally) plot assumptions on a 2x2 matrix:

• High Impact / High Uncertainty: These are your top priority for questioning. The potential fallout of being wrong is huge.
• High Impact / Low Uncertainty: Validate these periodically, but they are likely more stable.
• Low Impact / High Uncertainty: Worth a quick check, but don't over-invest time.
• Low Impact / Low Uncertainty: Generally safe to leave unexamined unless circumstances change drastically.

4. INTEGRATIVE QUESTIONS

• Strategy reviews question: What would have to be true for this to fail?
• Project kick-offs question: What assumptions are we making about resources, customers, market response?
• Post-mortems questions: What did we assume that turned out to be dead wrong? What can we learn?
• Decisions questions: What are we assuming here, and what if the opposite were true? What are the top 3 assumptions we’re resting this on? What if they’re wrong?

5. MEETING ROLES TO ASSIGN

• The Devil’s Advocate: “That might not be true.”
• The Toddler: “But why is that true?”
• Normalise dissent. Make curiosity part of your culture. That’s real strategy hygiene.

6. STRATEGIC HIRE

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

What looks like leadership decisiveness is often a cognitive trap that costs businesses billions. This video dissects "The Decisiveness Trap"—the psychological bias that causes leaders to solve the wrong problem with disastrous consequences, as seen with Boeing and the 'New Coke' fiasco.

We explore the psychology of the 'rush to solutions,' also known as premature closure bias. Learn why the pressure to act quickly often leads to poor problem framing, causing leaders to skip critical thinking in favor of action. Drawing on shocking data from medical misdiagnoses and legal 'tunnel vision,' we reveal how this bias is a systemic flaw in how we approach problem-solving.

Stop celebrating fast answers and start asking the right questions. This is your guide to developing the discipline of deep analysis and ensuring you never again perfectly solve the wrong problem.

UNLOCK THE STRATEGIST'S EDGE

Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 The Billion-Pound Problem You're Solving Wrong

00:31 The Premature Closure Bias in Medicine (Shocking Stats)

01:16 The Trap of Plunging In and Premature Closure in Business with Data

03:30 Business by Strategy vs Business by Assumption

04:01 Thinking Deep vs. Moving Fast: Finding the Balance

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

Are you swamped with Stress, Struggle, and Suffering? Is your business Stuck?

They are the prison of your mind. Not because you are broken, but because you haven't been told the truth.

Welcome to Unbound Mind.

This channel is built on one radical idea: The psychological traps that sink billion-dollar businesses are the exact same traps that destroy your life and mental health.

We don't do "ego-soothing" answers here. We challenge the comfortable lies that keep you stuck. We deconstruct the psychology of self-sabotage, resilience, and freedom.

If you are ready to stop looking for hacks and start taking responsibility for your mind... Subscribe.

What We Cover:

Behavioural Economics

Western & Eastern Psychology

Western & Eastern Philosophy

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/

2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.

3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

The Dunning-Kruger effect, famously inspired by a bank robber who used lemon juice for invisible ink, explains why incompetent confidence is a dangerous business trap. This video is a deep dive into the psychology of why we often don't know what we don't know.

Discover why unskilled individuals often climb to the peak of "Mount Stupid"—a state of high confidence born from ignorance—while true experts tend to underestimate their own abilities. We break down the Four Stages of Competence, from Unconscious Incompetence to Unconscious Competence, and explain the vital role of metacognition in self-awareness. Using data on trader performance and stories of catastrophic overconfidence, we reveal how this cognitive bias sabotages decision-making and blocks learning.

This is your guide to navigating the painful but necessary 'Valley of Despair' on the path to true mastery and avoiding the costly trap of ignorant certainty.

UNLOCK THE STRATEGIST'S EDGE

Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 Darwin, Lemon Juice & The Confidence Paradox

00:49 Dunning-Kruger Explained: Why Incompetence Breeds Confidence

01:29 The Psychology: Ego, Metacognition & Bounded Rationality with Data

02:14 Bounded Rationality Concept

02:51 Real-World Examples: Influencers, CEOs, Parents, and Dog Owners

04:06 Why It Happens: The Brain's Need for Certainty

04:39 Mapping Competence: Four Stages of Learning & 'Mount Stupid'

09:02 Conscious Competence & The Curse of Knowledge

09:14 Knowing How To Think & Socrates’ Antidote: Knowing What You Don't Know

10:08 Elevate Your Strategic Knowledge

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

Cognitive dissonance creates a dangerous 'Ostrich Effect' in business, where leaders ignore critical problems to protect their emotional comfort. As Samsung learned with a $22 billion loss, this avoidance strategy can be catastrophic.

This video dives into the psychology of why we "fix the feeling, not the problem." Tracing the concept from Freud's defence mechanisms to Leon Festinger's groundbreaking Cognitive Dissonance Theory, we explain the mental discomfort that drives us to bury our heads in the sand. Learn the real-world costs of this bias: how it leads to unsolved problems, destroys team productivity by 20%, and cripples long-term strategic thinking.

Stop choosing temporary emotional comfort over the long-term health of your business. This analysis provides the framework to recognise and override this destructive instinct, empowering you to make decisions based on reality, not avoidance.

UNLOCK THE STRATEGIST'S EDGE

Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 The £22 Billion Warning: Samsung's Ostrich Moment

00:46 Why We Bury Our Heads: The Psychology of Avoidance

01:10 The Psychology of Avoidance (Cognitive Dissonance, Freud, Ancient Greeks)

01:46 Business Consequences: Productivity, Dysfunction & Delayed Damage with Data

02:28 Why Emotional Comfort Isn’t Free

03:06 Comfort vs. Clarity: The Painkiller Analogy

03:20 Beyond Avoidance: Towards Strategic Honesty

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

Intellectual courage is the antidote to herd mentality. This video is a practical guide for leaders on how to cultivate true independent thinking, even when everyone around you is following trends.

We break down the fundamental choice every non-conformist faces: the external discomfort of standing out versus the internal friction of being out of alignment. Discover actionable strategies to build your capacity for independent thought, including using a Beginner's Mind, actively seeking disagreement, playing devil's advocate, and using your core business strategy as a filter against fleeting fads.

This isn't just about being contrarian; it's about developing the clarity and conviction to lead on your own terms.

UNLOCK THE STRATEGIST'S EDGE

Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 Intro

00:08 A Questioning Habit That Frees You from Conformity

00:32 Consequences of Freedom - Internal Peace vs. External Conformity

01;39 Avoiding Conformity in Business

01:51 Principle 1 – Beginner’s Mind

02:19 Principle 2 – Real Research (Not Recycled Thought)

02:41 Principle 3 – Thinking for Yourself - Diverse & Unrelated Sources

03:24 Principle 4 – Invite Disagreement

03:53 Principle 5 – Add Frictions to Your Decision-Making

04;13 Principle 6 – Strategy as a Decision Filter

04:45 Subscribe – Why You *Need* This Channel as a Leader

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.

The blind acceptance of 'best practices' is often a symptom of herd mentality, a cognitive trap that stifles innovation and promotes mediocrity. This video explains the psychology of conformity and why the most popular business advice is often the most dangerous.

Drawing on the classic Asch Conformity Experiment, which showed 75% of people will knowingly give a wrong answer to fit in, we explore how social proof shapes our decisions. Discover how the "attention economy" rewards superficial, copycat tactics over deep, critical thinking, leading to strategic failure. We dissect why your business might be operating like the artisans in the 'Pottery Cave'—mistaking the darkness of conformity for the reality of the market.

If you're ready to break free from cloned thinking and develop a real competitive edge, this analysis is your first step. Learn to question assumptions, reject superficial trends, and build a strategy based on originality, not just popularity.

UNLOCK THE STRATEGIST'S EDGE

Your inbox deserves substance, not filler. Download the 100+ page Business Strategy Toolkit - “From Purpose To Profit.” Includes strategy templates, decision filters, and customer understanding frameworks to dissect, diagnose & dominate your strategy. No spam. Just clarity & rule-breaking insight.

Download here: https://www.erinandreacraske.com/strategy-toolkit

IN THIS EPISODE

00:00 Trigger Warning & The Rise of Viral BS

01:09 Why Bad Advice Goes Viral (Cognitive Decline Data)

02:36 Business See, Business Do: The Copy-Paste Epidemic

04:13 Trained for Conformity: School, Work & Society

05:31 The Potter in the Cave: An Analogy for Stuck Thinking

07:38 Superficiality Culture & Heard Mentality: From Plato to TikTok

08:25 The Attention Economy's Toll (Life & Business Costs) with Data

10:03 Treating Escaping Reality Mental Issues (Superficial Coping) with Embracing Reality

11:06 How Superficiality, Herd Mentality, Social Proof, and Conditioning Trap Us

14:11 The Dangers of Outsourcing Your Brain (Costs of Herd Thinking) with Data

15:14 The Psychological Rave: Bandwagon Effect, Authority Bias, Confirmation Bias, and Halo Effect

16:16 JFK on Conformity: The Jailer of Freedom

17:03 Building a Cognitive Immune System - Think for Yourself

18:15 Tulip Mania Market Crash Echoes

KEEP IN TOUCH

1. Fancy weekly quick-read summaries? Subscribe here: https://erinandreacraske.substack.com/
2. Enjoy video content? I’ve got you covered. The UNBOUND MIND. UNBOUND SELF YouTube channel awaits.
3. Ready to ditch the 4S of Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness in one go and for all? Drop me a line on www.erinandreacraske.com or find me on LinkedIn.

Time to set yourself free!

ABOUT UNBOUND MIND

UNBOUND MIND confronts the prisons of our own making: Stress, Struggle, Suffering, and Stuckness.

We operate on one radical truth: the psychological traps that sink businesses are the exact same traps that screw your life and your mental health.

Here, we dissect the cognitive biases, flawed cultural narratives, and comfortable lies that keep you trapped. This isn't about easy, ego-soothing answers. It's about giving you the tools of provocative thinking to reclaim your power, forge resilience, and achieve true cognitive freedom.

This channel is a toolkit for leaders, thinkers, and anyone ready to take responsibility for their own mind.

Subscribe to get unbound.