“If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about solutions.” Albert Einstein
This enlightened quotation by Albert Einstein points to the reason for the failings of many modern innovation and solutions. “Twenty-five percent of failures were due to people trying to solve the wrong problems,” says inventor Darrell Mann, CTO of consulting agency Blackswan, former chief engineer at Rolls-Royce, where he studied innovation duds and dynamos for 15 years.
What organizations struggle with is not solving problems but figuring out what the true problems are they’re trying to solve. Essentially, individuals and organizations are bad at problem diagnosis. Spurred by a penchant for action, corporate and organization executives tend to switch quickly into problem solving mode without checking whether they really understand the problem.
Well-defined problems lead to well aligned and breakthrough solutions. Most companies and organizations aren’t sufficiently rigorous in defining the problems they’re attempting to solve and articulating why those issues are important. Without that rigor, organizations miss opportunities, waste resources, and end up pursuing innovation initiatives that aren’t aligned with their strategies or mission.
Many companies and organizations need to become better at devoting the time and resources to ask the right questions so that they can define and tackle the right problems.
Asking questions and defining problems are key steps in the solution-finding process! Watch as the Cat in the Hat sings a song about trying different solutions and not giving up.#earlyed #STEM @pbsteachers https://t.co/zfLKMehT0Z
— GPB Education (@GPBEducation) February 16, 2021
References:
- https://www.inc.com/thebuildnetwork/you-cannot-solve-what-you-dont-understand.html
- https://hbr.org/2017/01/are-you-solving-the-right-problems?ab=at_art_art_1x1
- https://hbr.org/2012/09/the-power-of-defining-the-prob