Tips for Building Capabilities to Solve Cross Functional Technical Problems

As a tech organization grows, the hardest problems remain at the boundaries between teams. Each team does its part, but gaps emerge when viewed as a whole, and important problems get left unattended with no one taking ownership.

The essence of Cross Functional problems cannot be solved by simple collaboration. Meetings, schedule management, and risk organization alone are not enough. The real bottleneck lies in an empty decision-making structure, an ambiguous Owner, or conflicting priorities. The key is redefining the problem into a structure that can actually be solved.

At Toss, the TPM (Technical Program Manager) takes on this role. Six core capabilities are needed:

• Problem redefinition: Finding the real problem beneath the surface symptoms
• Structuring: Breaking down ambiguity into manageable units
• Strategic judgment: Distinguishing between busy problems and big problems
• Execution conversion: Making people actually move
• Influence: Moving through trust even without formal authority
• Integrated perspective: Seeing people and structure together

In organizations with low autonomy, a phased approach is needed. Build trust by actually solving small problems first, embed structuring within coordination, and make Ownership clear even within a small scope. It's more effective to create working examples first, rather than defining roles first.

Every organization has problems where everyone is busy but nothing gets resolved. Rather than fixing the schedule or reporting system first, the starting point is to re-examine what the real bottleneck is and what structure is blocking execution.