I’ve heard this cited by a couple ctos I’ve worked for. It’s a popular metaphor in the engineering department. I think it’s articulating an important message, but in an ineffective way. The name “XY Problem” is too vague and easy to forget. I prefer simpler messages like:

- What’s the root cause of the problem?

- Is this a solution looking for a problem?

As software engineers, part of our job is naming things well and the “XY Problem” isn’t a great name IMO.