We’ve talked about how thinking in a mutually exclusive and collective exhaustive way is central to effective problem solving. But this is such an important concept that we should talk about it more.
First, be CEME, not MECE. In fact, be CEME-CEME-CEME
To solve a problem in a MECE way you need to consider all possible solutions exactly once. To do that, it is usually simpler to first think about all possible solutions and then to arrange them so that you only consider them once. So it’s really about being CEME rather than MECE.
