Becoming a Better Problem Solver

From time to time I've seen "solutions" to problems implemented because they originated from senior staff who developed a "feel" for the business over the years. There's no doubt experience in any field has high value, but when it begins to manifest into complacency it can become a detriment.

As humans we're wired to take action (or inaction) by making quick assumptions guided by past experience where personal bias plays a role in defining the "problem". Cognitive biases such as anchoring bias and confirmation bias lead to distortions of how we perceive problems over time, and heuristics allow us to make faster decisions but can create errors in judgement.

A few years back I worked at a company where a long-standing employee suddenly refused tasks they were assigned. Senior management asserted that the employee simply was no longer a "team player"; too stuck in their ways to accept the new direction the company was taking.

During a casual conversation, I sensed from the employee that there were deeper underlying issues going on. Unfortunately, within only a few weeks the employee resigned. I've since wondered whether senior management were right in their perception of the situation.

I'll probably never know the real reason why the employee decided to leave a 20+ year dedicated career.

Behold the fishbone / cause and effect or Ishikawa diagram - a simple visualization method for organizing potential causes and sub-causes of problems, used commonly in product design, quality control and project management applications, but in reality it can be applied to any problem or situation requiring action.

Here's how it works:

• Using the diagram above, you simply plot an identified problem on the far right square.
• Establish and plot categories of causes that could be possible reasons for the problem in the bubbles on the left top and bottom.
• The process of identifying causes is to keep asking why over and over, breaking down the problem into smaller components (causes). Plot these in the branches connected to the category bubbles.
• Once you have mapped out as many possible causes as you can, you can investigate each further to try to understand how to reduce or eliminate the problem all together. If you eliminate the causes, you eliminate the problem.

Going back to my example about the disgruntled employee, let's consider how a cause and effect diagram might have helped better understand the problem with the employee's performance.

For starters, personal-related matters might have lead to the change of behavior (this could have been a cause category). Perhaps they had recently lost a loved one or a pet? moved to a new home? had been experiencing financial troubles? dealt with difficult family matters over the past few months? All of these could have been potential causes influencing the change in behavior of the employee over time.

Another cause category could have been work-related matters such as a recent increase in work load, changes to company policies, a delay in training to perform new assigned tasks, recent altercations with other employees or a change in management leading to additional stress.

A third category might have been environmental changes such as volume issues in neighboring work areas, a recent move to another office location or ongoing equipment failures.

Doing a simple analysis of potential causes could have created a pathway to correcting the key issues which may have improved the satisfaction and morale of the employee, possibly avoiding their resignation as a result.

As with the example above, by developing a cause and effect approach to problem solving you'll find conversations with employees, stakeholders, customers, suppliers, friends or family more productive and the solutions to problems will often present themselves in more objective and straight-forward ways.

You don't have to map out a complete diagram for every situation- just applying the idea conceptually and taking a moment to evaluate and investigate possible problem causes might be enough to make better decisions each day. That can add up a significant gains over time.

I can say with confidence that the cause and effect / fishbone diagram technique has made me a better problem solver, both in my personal and professional life. I recommend giving this tool a try next time you face a problem and want to get to the heart of the matter.