Problem Solving
By the time you begin an MBA program, you have no doubt
solved your share of work-related problems. However, research
indicates that people often settle on the first acceptable solution they
find rather than completing a rational or creative thinking process that
leads to the best solution. In this portion of the
orientation, you will learn how to solve problems both rationally and
creatively, and how to overcome the most common obstacles to creativity.
Rational problem solving typically consists of four steps:
- Define the problem. There is a saying that correctly
identifying a problem brings you halfway to the solution. Often, our
first consciousness that a problem exists stems from its symptoms rather than
from the problem itself. For instance, if a member of your staff is
impolite to a client on the phone, the problem may not be that your staff
member is impolite--it may be that he needs customer service training, or
that he is having difficulty coping with the stress that his professional
responsibilities involve. Make sure that you're looking for a cure
for the disease, not its symptoms.
- Generate alternatives. Once you have correctly
identified the problem, make a list of possible solutions. Solicit
solution proposals from all parties involved in the problem. Do not
evaluate or discard any of the possible solutions until you have completed
the list. When you're preparing to evaluate your list, consider
whether the proposed solutions are consistent with your organization's
mission and vision, and what the short and long-term consequences of each
alternative would be. Above all, make sure that the proposed
solutions actually solve the problem at hand--it's fine to have an
alternative that kills two birds with one stone, as long as the first bird
is the one you were aiming at.
- Evaluate alternatives. After you have ensured that all
the possible solutions in front of you meet the conditions listed above,
begin weighing the advantages and disadvantages of each solution.
Think about any possible side effects of each solution, how acceptable
each solution will be to all parties, and how likely you are to be able to
implement each solution given constraints such as time and money.
Look for the best all-around solution, not simply one that will
work. Taking your time with the evaluation process will ensure that
you don't settle on the first available option.
- Implement your
solution. Solution implementation varies widely according to the
type of problem you are confronting, but in general the two keys to
successful implementation are getting everyone concerned involved in the
implementation to achieve buy-in, and following up on the solution to see
if it worked and to see how the people involved felt about the process and
the outcome.
In some cases, rational problem solving is derailed because
the people involved don't agree on the problem, or the problem is too
ambiguous or nebulous for a systematic approach. In these cases, you
must be prepared to solve the problem creatively. There are also
four steps to the creative problem solving model:
- Prepare. Your efforts to solve the problem rationally may have
resulted in your completing this stage, which includes data gathering,
problem definition, alternative generation, and at least preliminary
evaluation of alternatives. However, in this stage of the creative
model, you may need to backtrack and see if you defined the problem
correctly or exhausted the alternatives. (Specific creativity blocks
and methods for overcoming them will be addressed later in this module.)
- Incubate. Try to stop thinking about the problem consciously for a
day or two. Your mind will continue to work on the problem in the
background and may generate some observations or ideas that your conscious
mind has missed.
- Illuminate. In this stage, you recognize
a new idea or angle that your mind has generated and articulate it as a new
problem definition or solution alternative.
- Verify. As in
the rational model, your creative solution must be evaluated in terms of
side effects, universal acceptability, constraints of implementation, and
compatibility with mission and vision.
Unfortunately,
your formal education and professional experience may hinder creative
thinking, because you're accustomed to the rules and right answers which
characterize rational thinking.
Conceptual blocks result. Following is a list of common conceptual
blocks, and suggested exercises for overcoming them.
- Vertical
thinking - People bogged down in vertical thinking settle on a problem
definition early and won't stray from it. As a result of their
failure to look for an alternate definition or to see the problem from
another angle, they find themselves unable to generate good solution
alternatives. Lateral
thinking exercises can help develop the ability to see a problem from
multiple angles and generate alternate definitions.
- One
thinking language - Most people think in the verbal language they learned
as children, and this is the language they use to define and solve
problems. However, other languages for problem solving exist,
including nonverbal, symbolic, sensory, and emotional languages.
When your verbal approach to solving a problem isn't leading you to a good
solution, see if you can reframe the problem in another language. Is
there a math equation that would help you make sense of the task?
Are their sensory details that you have omitted from consideration because
they don't seem rational?
- Perceptual stereotyping - Your past
experiences may determine how you define a future problem. We
naturally look for connections between the situation at hand and
situations which have already been resolved as a starting point for idea
generation. However, if you see more of a relationship than truly
exists, this approach may prevent you from arriving at a solution to the
new problem. At times, arriving at a good solution will require you
to disregard past experience and even conventional wisdom.
- Ignoring commonalities - Occasionally, you will be confronted with a
problem that appears to have no connection with any problem you've ever
faced before. However, if you are able to find something that this
problem has in common with another one--a theme, cause, or the like--you
will find that you have successfully defined the problem already and may
begin generating solution alternatives. One exercise that can help
you with this is to pick two fundamentally unrelated areas, such as
accounting and architecture, and try to make a list of vocabulary the two
fields have in common.
- Accepting artificial constraints -
Sometimes you define a problem so narrowly that it is impossible to
generate a solution--essentially, you can't see the forest for the
trees. Your narrow definition probably arises from assumptions
you've drawn about the problem of which you're not even conscious.
Lateral thinking puzzles can help with this type of block as well.
Another good exercise is to place 9 circles in a three-by-three grid and
try to draw four straight lines that pass through all 9 circles without
ever lifting your pencil. Once you've found a way to do this, try
doing it with three lines, then two, then only one. What assumptions
did you make about the "correct" solution to this problem that
prevented you from solving it on the first try?
- Rejecting real
constraints - Sometimes you define a problem so broadly that it can't be
solved--in other words, you're looking at the forest and missing the trees
entirely. Try pulling the problem definition apart one tree at a
time and see if the problem is actually simpler than you realized.
- Failing to question - One of the easiest ways to settle on an incorrect
problem definition and an ineffective solution is simply not to ask any
questions. If you are surrounded by people who seem to be on the
same page about the problem, you may be reluctant to ask a
"dumb" question that they have probably already
considered. Ask it anyway. One of the reasons organizations
use work teams so often now is because they've found that multiple
perspectives often result in higher-quality decisions--you may be the
first person in your group to have thought of your question.
- Failing to think - Sometimes we become so accustomed to a pattern of
problem-solution that we are complacent and even lazy about trying to
think in a new direction. Making a habit of solving puzzles or
playing mentally stimulating games will keep your mind agile and more
receptive to creative problem solving methods.
