When I was a teenager, I was lucky enough to learn how to fly gliders. One evening, a friend of my parents—retired Air Force General Philippe Archambeaud—asked me how many hours I had flown. “Thirty,” I said. “Well,” he replied,…
Download this quick reference guide to the four key rules for developing quality situation-complication-question (SCQ) sequence.
You take your seat in attendance, the meeting starts, and our friendly presenter, Bob, projects a “background” slide. It’s filled with information related to the issue at hand. Some of the information is clearly relevant, other appears barely peripheral, and…
As some may know, I have a book on strategic thinking in complex problem solving. It uses a story to introduce the problem-solving process and tools: one day, my dog William goes missing, and there’s a pretty good chance that…
Decision making is a critical part of solving complex problems. In theory, it happens after framing the problem and exploring options and criteria, in the form of a climax where the fundamental components of the process—the question you’re answering, the…
Over the past five months, two Boeing 737 Max airliners have crashed, killing 346 people. Although the story is still unfolding and the investigation is underway, preliminary evidence suggests that design flaws are the cause of the crashes. Here’s a recap…
If someone starts a phrase with “strategy is about … ,” assume that what comes next is hot air. Because three phrases later, strategy will be about something else. And three phrases after that, it will be about something else….
“All models are wrong but some are useful.” – George Box As an engineer, I was trained to model the world: take a complex system—say, an oil-well drillstring extending several kilometers underground—make assumptions on what matters (e.g., contact with the…
‘Nothing avails but perfection’ may be spelt shorter: ‘Paralysis.’ — Winston Churchill Up until recently, my job entailed updating the faculty policy of a research-intensive university. How do you change the rules that regulate the life of some 500 tenured…
Many of us first interact with problems in a primary-school mathematics class. If your experience is anything like mine, it might have gone like this: “Édouard has a swimming pool. One pump can fill the pool in two hours; the…
There’s widespread agreements across disciplines that effective problem solvers have both deep and broad knowledge (see references below). Depth of knowledge usually isn’t the problem, because it is the central component of many formal training programs. However, most of us don’t…
Isomorphic problems are those that have the same underlying structure. Recognizing that that new problem you’re facing is similar to one that has been solved before, or a simpler one, can go a long way in improving your creativity. Meet…
Recently, I had a conversation with a dean of engineering. He was looking for a big idea—one to take his school from here (top 20 in the US) to there—the ultra-nerd stratosphere. I offered that he promoted training his students…
A central aspect of my approach to solving complex problems builds on the widespread agreement that effective problem solvers are T-shaped, with both depth and breadth of knowledge. Develop a breadth of skills & knowledge The breadth of knowledge—what I call strategic thinking—includes having…
My upcoming book, Strategic Thinking in Complex Problem Solving, is available for pre-order. It will ship on August 3, 2016. The book includes many of the ideas covered on this site with a deeper treatment and references. Here is a brief intro:…
Many of the advanced doctoral students I speak with share one characteristics: they fail to recognize that they have transferrable skills and knowledge. And, as they finally land an interview with a potential employer, they’re selling themselves short. But getting an advanced…
Just a quick note to let you know that the book I’ve been working on, Strategic Thinking in Problem Solving, is now officially under contract with Oxford University Press. More soon.
“Problem solving in medicine is not the same as in military” or so the thinking goes. Of course, there are obvious differences and these differences call for specialized training. But there are also common denominators, and it’s to your benefit to…
Using analogies can help you approach new, unfamiliar problems creatively, but they can also be constraining. To sidestep this limitation, understand your assumptions and look for alternative analogies. Analogies can help you approach unfamiliar problems Facing an unfamiliar problem, using…
The task is simple enough: I’ll give you three numbers, and you guess which rule I had in mind that applies to the set. Ready? 2 – 4 – 6 This is the initial step of Wason’s famous 1960 experiment. The…
Chances are, you are not solving the problem that you should. Nothing personal, dear reader, as I wholeheartedly trust your instincts and impeccable judgment, but focusing on our perceived problem—rather than a better one—happens to the best of us. We…
Working for Accenture had its ups and downs, but one great, great up was a simple idea: help others be successful. Thinking about it after so many years, there are a couple of instances that stem out: – In my…
Decision making is a critical part of the problem-solving process. But it is also only that: a part. The process has several others; don’t overlook some at the expense of others. (This post is a summary of a guest article I did…
My good friend and mentor, stochastic processes über-guru Pol Spanos, has many wise sayings. One is: intuition is a good servant but a terrible master. Check your assumptions A recent report by the National Research Council of the National Academies looks further…
Framing your problem well is of paramount importance, and yet, it’s easy to focus on a poor problem. Here are some guidelines to help you discover a good problem and stay on target. Think about a painting; the frame is a…
Citing Baddeley (2003)*, the Oxford Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning defines working memory as ‘the ability to maintain and manipulate information in short-term memory while resisting interference.’ A recent report by the National Academy of Sciences partially dedicated to helping students with problems…
“Have the breadth to see the problems, and the depth to solve them.” — Anonymous (as reported in Tomorrow’s Professor by Richard Reis) Think of problem solving as the combination of divergent and convergent thinking. When answering a ‘how can we do…
If you are in a managerial position, you should be concerned about how to get the best people to your team and how to help them do their job optimally. A recent publication from the National Research Council looked at how…
Whenever you’re facing a new, complex problem to solve, step back and reflect on your general approach from a philosophical point of view: are you aiming at solving it completely straight from the beginning or are you integrating a learning…