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.
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“The more cheese, the more holes; but the more holes, the less cheese. Therefore the more cheese, the less cheese.” So goes the paradoxe du fromage à trous. Nothing that couldn’t be fixed with a little more accuracy on what we mean….
“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…
“When the facts change, I change my opinion. What do you do, sir?” — John Maynard Keynes In many situations, we don’t follow Keynes’ approach. In fact, in light of new evidence, we usually don’t update our initial beliefs as…
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…
On January 8 1989, British Midland Airways Boeing 737 was cruising at 28,000 ft when a strong vibration shook the plane. Fumes and a burned smell led the crew to believe that one of the engines was malfunctioning. When they throttled back…
Before actively looking for solutions, you should ensure that you understand the problem and its root causes. That is, diagnose before prescribing. Our four-step process makes this explicit—and it makes implicit sense to do so, too—and yet, we constantly fail to do so….
Have you lost your dog? Here are some ideas that can help you find him/her. When I teach strategic thinking to solve problems, I use a case study along the semester to help students relate ideas to a concrete situation. The…
Many PowerPoint presentations are dreadful. But that doesn’t mean that yours have to be. Capturing ideas in the taglines of slides can go a long way towards improving the quality of your presentations. Yale’s Edward Tufte, a preeminent specialist in data…
Confirmation bias—seeking and interpreting evidence partially so as to support one’s beliefs—is so destructive that it can render your analysis useless. And chances are, you are a victim of it. Raymond Nickerson, a psychology professor at Tufts University, found evidence…