Anyone who hands you the fix in five minutes is selling, not diagnosing.
You cannot properly diagnose a business that fast. Good advice names your real constraint and mostly stops there. A tool for screening every advisor, agency, and consultant who wants your money, and a discipline to use on yourself before you spend a dollar.
You cannot properly diagnose a business in five minutes. So when someone hands you the fix that fast, they are not diagnosing, they are selling. Good advice names your real constraint and mostly stops there, because naming it correctly is the hard and valuable part. Prescribing the fix is easy, and it is usually where the selling hides. This is a tool for screening everyone who wants your money.
The tell
The fastest way to spot a pitch wearing a diagnosis is to watch two things: how quickly the fix arrives, and whether the fix happens to be the exact thing they sell. A real diagnosis asks more than it answers and often lands somewhere inconvenient, including on the answer they least want to give: your constraint is this, and it is not the thing I do. If you never hear that from someone, you are not being diagnosed.
Why fast fixes are a red flag
A constraint is specific to you
Your actual bottleneck is particular to your business, your stage, and your people. A fix that arrives before any real look at those was pre-loaded before you spoke. It was going to be the answer no matter what you said.
The fix that fits everyone fits no one
If the same person prescribes the same solution to every founder they meet, that is not a diagnosis, it is a product with a consultation-shaped wrapper. The tell is sameness: your problem and the last person's problem somehow have the identical answer.
Naming is the hard part
Correctly naming the constraint is most of the work and most of the value. Prescribing is the easy downstream step. When someone rushes past the naming to get to the prescription, they are skipping the part that is actually worth paying for.
Use it on yourself too
This is not only a filter for advisors, it is a discipline for you. Before you spend money on any fix, force yourself to name the actual constraint first, in one specific sentence. Most wasted spend in a business is a fix applied to a constraint that was never named, or was named wrong. If you cannot state the constraint plainly, you are not ready to buy the solution.
How to screen for it
Ask how they decided
Ask what they think your constraint is and how they arrived at it. A real answer walks you through your specifics. A weak one restates their offer.
Watch if the fix is their product
Notice whether the recommended solution is, conveniently, the thing they sell. Sometimes it honestly is the right fit. Often it is the only tool they own.
Reward the uncomfortable truth
The person worth listening to is the one who will tell you the inconvenient thing before it costs you, even when it means less business for them. Pay attention to who does that.
So hold everyone who wants to help you to one bar: name my constraint, and be honest about whether your fix is the right one for it. Anyone who leads with the fix, and whose fix is always the same, is selling. The ones worth keeping name the problem first, even when the truth is not in their interest.
Want a diagnosis, not a pitch?
The strategy call is exactly that: I name your actual constraint, and I will tell you if the fix is not the thing I do. It is free and you keep the read either way. If the timing is not right, the community costs nothing.