problem solving mindset

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Solving Tough Problems Requires a Mindset Shift

• Marianne W. Lewis
• Wendy K. Smith

Instead of either/or thinking, try both/and.

Leaders face a daily barrage of competing demands and multiple stakeholders with different opinions and incentives. To navigate the chaos, most people’s brains default to “either-or” thinking when “both-and” thinking would lead to more creative and novel solutions. Drawing on 20 years of research, the authors provide a three-step process for solving tough problems by adopting a paradox mindset — a comfort and willingness to accept competing demands as a potential source of new ideas and opportunities.

If you are leading an organization — large or small — you may be feeling stuck in ongoing tug-of-wars of competing demands. How do I innovate and change without losing focus of the current product? How do I build a sustainable business but still make profit? How do I attract top talent without overspending my HR budget?

• ML Marianne W. Lewis is dean of the University of Cincinnati’s Lindner School of Business and a professor of management. She formerly served as dean at Cass Business School in London, She is the co-author of Both/And Thinking .
• WS Wendy K. Smith  is the Emma Smith Morris Professor of Management and academic director of the Women’s Leadership Initiative at the University of Delaware’s Lerner College of Business & Economics. She is the co-author of Both/And Thinking .

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People with a 'growth mindset' are better problem-solving — here are 4 ways to develop one, according to experts

• People with healthy growth mindsets are often more curious and motivated to learn new things.
• Researchers from Yale-NUS College say this mindset can be developed with practice.
• Instead of expecting to simply "find" your passions, make an effort to nurture and develop them.

Problem-solving may be among the more underrated skills. Research from Yale-NUS College suggests we can improve our problem-solving skills with something called a "growth mindset."

What are growth mindsets?

People with growth mindsets see interest or a spark of curiosity as something that can be developed, explains Paul O'Keefe, an assistant professor of psychology at Yale-NUS College.

"By understanding interest is [a] thing that develops over time, maybe with interaction with getting involved with commitment, [growth mindsets] build over time and grow and become interests," O'Keefe said.

O'Keefe's team's 2021 study builds on earlier work. Its research thus far suggests that the benefits of cultivating growth mindsets are plentiful, including adaptability, innovative thinking, and problem-solving.

How to develop a growth mindset

If you went to a liberal-arts school, you may already be further along than you think, since liberal-arts education focuses on broadening students' knowledge with a foundation in a variety of disciplines. This supports the growth theory of interest from an educational standpoint.

In contrast, O'Keefe's research indicates students who believe their interests lie in limited areas are "not as inclined to see how outside areas of knowledge can be connected and integrated with their existing interests." 

1. Feed your curiosity

People with growth mindsets are often more curious and motivated to learn. When you don't know something and absolutely have to know it, chances are you consult Google. In " The Science of Interest ," O'Keefe and Judith Harackiewicz say "interest" can be sparked by a desire to fill gaps in our knowledge.

Related stories

Whether you're looking up why clouds are shaped a certain way or watching YouTube tutorials on how to play the harmonica, you're doing it because you don't know and you want to know.

2. Rethink 'finding your passion'

Have you ever noticed how influential figures talk about "finding your calling"? Well, it turns out the idea that your passion is just there, waiting for you to find it if you look hard enough, may just not be true. 

O'Keefe's research calls this idea (of a passion waiting to be found) a "fixed mindset of interests." People with fixed mindsets of interest believe their interests are already there, inherent within them, and just need to be revealed. 

Erik Weisz didn't wake up and realize he was a magician overnight; he spent years practicing and developing tricks before he became Harry Houdini. In reality, instead of finding our passions, we need to take the time and effort to nurture them.

3. Become a 't-shaped' person

Though great things can come from developing one expertise, O'Keefe stresses that the potential for innovation when you color outside the lines is tremendous.

"Once we start to expand our focus outside of our silo of say, interests, we start to understand the value of other information," O'Keefe said. "And we begin to see connections between what we know already from our own interests, and connecting it to new interests."

"One of the things they do at their organization is that they hire people who they call 'T-shaped' people." T-shaped people have a singular pillar of expertise or interest with broader interests. "They might not be experts in another area, but they certainly have some basic knowledge, some interests that are far-reaching."

4. Look at your work environment

At an organizational level, growth mindsets can be underestimated. Think of the old-school finance giant that hired the best of the best in marketing, sales, finance, etc. Those hires went on to compose tighter groups of highly specialized professionals. 

But when you hire diverse teams, "you don't get people who are all just thinking from one discipline," O'Keefe explained. "You're getting people who have been exposed to different ideas."

What's more, you can't be the "logical" person of the team who looks down on the "artsy" person in the group. People with growth mindsets value being around people they can learn from. So, the next time you're at a conference or networking event, rather than seek out the people you'd have the most in common with, branch out and talk to the person you'd never ordinarily cross paths with. Maybe you'll learn a thing or two.

Correction: September 8, 2023 — An earlier version of this story misstated the name of the college where Paul O'Keefe works. It's Yale-NUS College, not Yale-National University of Singapore.

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Overview of the Problem-Solving Mental Process

Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

Rachel Goldman, PhD FTOS, is a licensed psychologist, clinical assistant professor, speaker, wellness expert specializing in eating behaviors, stress management, and health behavior change.

• Identify the Problem
• Define the Problem
• Form a Strategy
• Organize Information
• Allocate Resources
• Monitor Progress
• Evaluate the Results

Frequently Asked Questions

Problem-solving is a mental process that involves discovering, analyzing, and solving problems. The ultimate goal of problem-solving is to overcome obstacles and find a solution that best resolves the issue.

The best strategy for solving a problem depends largely on the unique situation. In some cases, people are better off learning everything they can about the issue and then using factual knowledge to come up with a solution. In other instances, creativity and insight are the best options.

It is not necessary to follow problem-solving steps sequentially, It is common to skip steps or even go back through steps multiple times until the desired solution is reached.

In order to correctly solve a problem, it is often important to follow a series of steps. Researchers sometimes refer to this as the problem-solving cycle. While this cycle is portrayed sequentially, people rarely follow a rigid series of steps to find a solution.

The following steps include developing strategies and organizing knowledge.

1. Identifying the Problem

While it may seem like an obvious step, identifying the problem is not always as simple as it sounds. In some cases, people might mistakenly identify the wrong source of a problem, which will make attempts to solve it inefficient or even useless.

Some strategies that you might use to figure out the source of a problem include :

• Asking questions about the problem
• Breaking the problem down into smaller pieces
• Looking at the problem from different perspectives
• Conducting research to figure out what relationships exist between different variables

2. Defining the Problem

After the problem has been identified, it is important to fully define the problem so that it can be solved. You can define a problem by operationally defining each aspect of the problem and setting goals for what aspects of the problem you will address

At this point, you should focus on figuring out which aspects of the problems are facts and which are opinions. State the problem clearly and identify the scope of the solution.

3. Forming a Strategy

After the problem has been identified, it is time to start brainstorming potential solutions. This step usually involves generating as many ideas as possible without judging their quality. Once several possibilities have been generated, they can be evaluated and narrowed down.

The next step is to develop a strategy to solve the problem. The approach used will vary depending upon the situation and the individual's unique preferences. Common problem-solving strategies include heuristics and algorithms.

• Heuristics are mental shortcuts that are often based on solutions that have worked in the past. They can work well if the problem is similar to something you have encountered before and are often the best choice if you need a fast solution.
• Algorithms are step-by-step strategies that are guaranteed to produce a correct result. While this approach is great for accuracy, it can also consume time and resources.

Heuristics are often best used when time is of the essence, while algorithms are a better choice when a decision needs to be as accurate as possible.

4. Organizing Information

Before coming up with a solution, you need to first organize the available information. What do you know about the problem? What do you not know? The more information that is available the better prepared you will be to come up with an accurate solution.

When approaching a problem, it is important to make sure that you have all the data you need. Making a decision without adequate information can lead to biased or inaccurate results.

5. Allocating Resources

Of course, we don't always have unlimited money, time, and other resources to solve a problem. Before you begin to solve a problem, you need to determine how high priority it is.

If it is an important problem, it is probably worth allocating more resources to solving it. If, however, it is a fairly unimportant problem, then you do not want to spend too much of your available resources on coming up with a solution.

At this stage, it is important to consider all of the factors that might affect the problem at hand. This includes looking at the available resources, deadlines that need to be met, and any possible risks involved in each solution. After careful evaluation, a decision can be made about which solution to pursue.

6. Monitoring Progress

After selecting a problem-solving strategy, it is time to put the plan into action and see if it works. This step might involve trying out different solutions to see which one is the most effective.

It is also important to monitor the situation after implementing a solution to ensure that the problem has been solved and that no new problems have arisen as a result of the proposed solution.

Effective problem-solvers tend to monitor their progress as they work towards a solution. If they are not making good progress toward reaching their goal, they will reevaluate their approach or look for new strategies .

7. Evaluating the Results

After a solution has been reached, it is important to evaluate the results to determine if it is the best possible solution to the problem. This evaluation might be immediate, such as checking the results of a math problem to ensure the answer is correct, or it can be delayed, such as evaluating the success of a therapy program after several months of treatment.

Once a problem has been solved, it is important to take some time to reflect on the process that was used and evaluate the results. This will help you to improve your problem-solving skills and become more efficient at solving future problems.

A Word From Verywell​

It is important to remember that there are many different problem-solving processes with different steps, and this is just one example. Problem-solving in real-world situations requires a great deal of resourcefulness, flexibility, resilience, and continuous interaction with the environment.

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You can become a better problem solving by:

• Practicing brainstorming and coming up with multiple potential solutions to problems
• Being open-minded and considering all possible options before making a decision
• Breaking down problems into smaller, more manageable pieces
• Asking for help when needed
• Researching different problem-solving techniques and trying out new ones
• Learning from mistakes and using them as opportunities to grow

It's important to communicate openly and honestly with your partner about what's going on. Try to see things from their perspective as well as your own. Work together to find a resolution that works for both of you. Be willing to compromise and accept that there may not be a perfect solution.

Take breaks if things are getting too heated, and come back to the problem when you feel calm and collected. Don't try to fix every problem on your own—consider asking a therapist or counselor for help and insight.

If you've tried everything and there doesn't seem to be a way to fix the problem, you may have to learn to accept it. This can be difficult, but try to focus on the positive aspects of your life and remember that every situation is temporary. Don't dwell on what's going wrong—instead, think about what's going right. Find support by talking to friends or family. Seek professional help if you're having trouble coping.

Davidson JE, Sternberg RJ, editors.  The Psychology of Problem Solving .  Cambridge University Press; 2003. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511615771

Sarathy V. Real world problem-solving .  Front Hum Neurosci . 2018;12:261. Published 2018 Jun 26. doi:10.3389/fnhum.2018.00261

By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."

11 Mindset Activities and Tests Designed to Nurture Growth

With the right mindset, it may be possible to handle challenges better and pursue success without getting down on yourself.

Nurturing a growth mindset could help you tackle life’s difficulties much more efficiently, and that applies to adults as well as children. If you want to learn more about mindset theory and how you can achieve a growth mindset yourself, read on.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free . These science-based exercises will explore fundamental aspects of positive psychology including strengths, values, and self-compassion, and will give you the tools to enhance the wellbeing of your clients, students, or employees.

This Article Contains:

What is mindset theory, using mindset therapy: what is a mindset intervention, using mindset with kids, 3 mindset tests, assessments, and questionnaires, exercises and activities to help achieve a growth mindset, mindset questions you should be asking, 3 useful mindset worksheets: skills and techniques to apply to your mindset, 5 ideas to help nurture a growth mindset, a take-home message.

Most positive psychology readers will already be familiar with mindset theory, or the idea that our beliefs influence the way we behave in response to life’s situations.

“Mindsets—or implicit theories—are the beliefs people have about the nature of human characteristics” (Murphy & Dweck, 2016, p. 127).

Mindset theory suggests that the way we view ourselves – our capabilities, talents, and intelligence – impacts our lives and success. At the same time, mindset theory covers how we choose to pursue our goals: whether we give up when faced with failure or respond with more effort and dedication.

Fixed vs. growth mindsets

According to Carol Dweck’s (2012) mindset theory, we all fall somewhere along a spectrum when it comes to our implicit beliefs. At one end, it’s possible to have a fixed mindset or an entity theory:

A fixed mindset is when people believe their basic qualities, their intelligence, their talents, their abilities, are just fixed traits. They have a certain amount, and that’s that.

If your implicit beliefs fall at the other end of the spectrum, you have a growth mindset – incremental theory :

[You] believe that even basic talents and abilities can be developed over time through experience, mentorship, and so on… and these are the people who go for it.

Dweck, 2012

A fixed mindset can often be associated with negative feelings when individuals encounter a setback. If we fail to meet goals (say an A+ on a test or a promotion at work), we may feel inadequate. That’s all we’re supposedly capable of after all, innately. Having a growth mindset, on the other hand, means we view our failures as “development points” and can work on them to succeed.

Perhaps for readily apparent reasons, mindset theory often gets applied in learning contexts, both in academia for students and in workplace coaching , leadership, and professional development.

As the name suggests, a mindset intervention is a program designed to strengthen growth mindsets in an academic setting. Typically, the motivation for mindset interventions has been to boost students’ academic potential by encouraging their beliefs that intellectual capabilities can be developed (Yeager et al., 2019).

Here is an excellent example of a mindset intervention delivered to more than 12,000 US high-schoolers (Yeager et al., 2019):

At the start of the 9th grade, the researchers delivered a 25-minute online student session that gave an overview of the growth mindset concept: that pupils could improve their intellectual capacities through various means (e.g., enhancing their learning strategies).

Between one and four weeks later, students went through a second session in which they were invited to learn more about growth mindsets. They were given stories from adult role models and older students, as well as interactive reflection sessions on how they might help others learn about a growth mindset.

At the close of the academic year, researchers measured the students’ grades and chosen courses for the next year before analyzing the data on grade improvements and their academic gains.

The authors found this low-cost, easy-to-implement mindset intervention was potentially linked to a few outcomes from the study. The intervention had a positive impact on students’ academic performance, both for low- and high-achieving pupils, and also increased the chances of students taking advanced math courses the next year (by 3%).

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One study of preschool kids demonstrated how a child’s mindset can influence not only their self-image but also their learning behaviors and resilience (Pawlina & Stanford, 2011). It suggests that by helping kids develop a sense of self-efficacy and agency, educators can help them tackle challenges with a growth mindset.

Teachers can:

• Encourage feelings of confidence and excitement that help children bounce back from failure
• Help them view effort and hard work as a ‘normal’ part of problem-solving
• Give them greater confidence in their ideas
• Drive kids to seek out and engage with challenges rather than avoid them

All of this was related to observable improvements in the kids’ persistence, resilience, and openness to “potential outcomes of difficult situations” (Pawlina & Stanford, 2011, p. 31).

Strategies to help kids develop a growth mindset

So, how do we put this into practice?

The authors suggest that teachers and caregivers can help kids in two ways: providing rationales and offering strategies that children can use.

Adults can help children realize that it’s normal to make mistakes. By purposefully reframing errors and slip-ups as part of life, young kids in this study became more accepting of the difficulty at hand.

Grown-ups can also try putting an optimistic spin on perceived failure, engaging kids in things that they find difficult. Use positive reinforcement, such as, “ Now you can do it, and you couldn’t do before! ” By making it exciting and presenting setbacks as a chance to improve, mistakes become part of the package.

Emphasize practice and progress. Teachers, parents, and caregivers can help kids focus on the learning process rather than the outcome by doing the same themselves.

Role-modeling is one way to help kids develop resilience. By highlighting your feelings when you make a mistake, then practicing positive self-talk and emphasizing the learning opportunity, children can learn to do the same. For instance: “ Oops, I forgot to take my shoes off and left mud everywhere. I’m feeling annoyed at myself. Oh well, next time, I’ll leave myself a reminder. ”

Avoid minimizing the difficulty of problem-solving. By trivializing situations and labeling them “easy” or “quick,” adults can discourage kids from persevering. Try to build enthusiasm without turning children off from trying hard and tackling challenges head on.

Let children deal with reasonable challenges by themselves. There’s no need to shelter kids from problems that they are capable of solving. As long as a challenge is not beyond their capabilities, they will learn from the ability to develop their problem-solving skills and from their failures. Of course, success in itself is positive reinforcement, so tasks should not be overly complicated.

Interested in assessing your own or your kids’ mindsets? Here are some scientifically validated, online assessments you can do.

1. Growth Mindset Assessment

Here’s a very, very short quiz; it’s only three questions long. It is called the Growth Mindset Scale and looks at your beliefs about the nature of intelligence and effort.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this very brief test is that you can view sample results from surveyed pupils. At the time of writing, only 30% had a growth mindset, according to this questionnaire.

These assessment are made available by the Raikes and William and Flora Hewlett Foundations (Dweck 2006; Blackwell, Trzesniewski, & Dweck, 2007; Dweck, 2012).

• Growth mindset for college students
• Growth mindset for 9th graders

2. Dweck Mindset Instrument

Here is a copy of Dweck’s original Mindset Instrument . It includes 16 items on a six-point Likert scale, such as:

• Your intelligence is something about you that you can’t change very much.
• No matter how much intelligence you have, you can always change it quite a bit.
• You have a certain amount of talent, and you can’t do much to change it.
• No matter who you are, you can significantly improve your level of talent.

This test was designed to assess the degree to which individuals feel or think that intelligence is changeable or fixed (P’Pool, 2012).

3. The Mindset Survey

The Mindset Survey is our very own PositivePsychology.com tool, and it aims to quantify your beliefs about how variable your intelligence is. Use this survey on your clients or yourself to get a good idea of how you view effort, learning, and ideal performance, as well as how you view setbacks and failure.

With eight items in total, this survey is measured on a four-point Likert scale and includes questions such as:

• You can learn new things, but you can’t change how intelligent you are.
• You can do things differently, but the important parts of who you are can’t be changed.

You can access The Mindset Survey with a subscription to the Positive Psychology Toolkit© .

Looking for some actionable ways to achieve a growth mindset? The following article includes some practical activities for students and adults: Growth Mindset vs. Fixed Mindset .

Some of the activities include:

The Crumpled Reminder Activity – This brief exercise invites you or your client to write down a recent setback you’ve experienced then reassess your understanding of failure.

A Classroom Discussion Task – These prompts encourage a discussion of the opportunities that arise from failure.

The Mistake Game – This exercise is designed to help students talk about mistakes openly, helping them to embrace them and use them for learning.

Changing your mindset means challenging your perspectives. Our thoughts, opinions, values, and beliefs are often so deeply ingrained that it’s difficult or even uncomfortable to start that process.

Imagine an iceberg.

The iceberg metaphor is very commonplace when we’re discussing our thoughts, behaviors, and their impact. If you bear with me, we can take this analogy and use it to understand how questioning helps us change our mindset.

At the tip of the iceberg – In the 10% floating above the surface, we have visible results. These might be successful results or failures. You might have landed the job of your dreams, or you might have failed an exam.

Below the surface – Then there’s the remaining 90% of the iceberg. This represents everything that the world doesn’t see. Here, we have everything that goes into that outcome. We have hard work, positive self-talk, and so forth. Or, we might have deeply set beliefs that unconsciously shape our behaviors. Think: “ What’s the point in studying anymore? I can’t do any better. ” Or think about hard work, repeated effort, and telling yourself: “ I’ve got it in me. Let’s try again, but smarter .”

By confronting these hidden beliefs and schemas with questions, we stand a much better chance of developing a growth mindset.

Great mindset questions to ask yourself

Let’s consider some of the most common things we tell ourselves and look at some questions we can ask in their place to change our mindsets.

At PositivePsychology.com, a whole comprehensive section of our toolkit is dedicated exclusively to mindset. Here are some of the worksheets we recommend if you’re trying to cultivate a growth mindset in yourself or a client. You can obtain access to the Positive Psychology Toolkit© and over 400 other tools and assessments with an annual subscription.

1. Increasing a Growth Mindset Through Writing

Reflective writing can help you develop a growth mindset by inviting you to evaluate your experiences so that you learn and improve your approach. By recounting an experience in hindsight, you can consider how the approaches and skills you used were helpful or otherwise. The idea is to grow from your experience and continue on toward success.

Increasing a Growth Mindset Through Writing gives you or your client a framework for this writing, encouraging you to take a mindful and purposeful approach to your learning experiences. You’ll identify the shortcomings of a particular process and develop an idea of how to amend them in the future.

2. Adopting a Growth Mindset to Criticism

Sometimes, it’s hard to receive feedback without feeling hurt or discouraged. Nonetheless, some people are able to absorb criticism and use it adaptively to work for results that they want. People with a growth mindset don’t allow themselves to become overwhelmed or upset with negative feedback; instead, they see it as a way to improve.

In this worksheet, you’re invited to reflect on a particular incident or event that made you feel negative – for instance, being told that you didn’t speak clearly in a presentation.

You’ll analyze this to a reasonable extent, then reframe the situation and create some self-affirming statements that help you handle it better next time. Through this exercise, you can develop your strategies for handling criticism and using it as encouragement instead.

3. Doors Closed, Doors Open

Failure sometimes feels like a loss, especially if you’re used to thinking with a fixed mindset. You missed an opportunity, pushed someone away, or disappointed a friend, and things seem pretty dismal.

Having the right mindset means being optimistic, learning to recognize and focus on the opportunities that have arisen from that failure, rather than fixating on the ‘closed door.’

This is a very simple yet powerful exercise that asks you to recollect a time when you felt like you missed out on or lost something through failure. It gives you prompts to help you reappraise that situation and consider the positives, along with your potential opportunities for growth.

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As we’ve seen, mindset is something that can be developed. So what can we do to cultivate a growth mindset? Here are some ideas.

1. Embrace more challenges

Failing can be tough when you have a fixed mindset. When we feel like our failures represent our limits, we avoid situations that could highlight those limitations. Develop your staying power and psychological flexibility by taking on new situations where failure is a definite possibility. If and when you fail, try again.

By changing your approach and learning from your setback, success will follow at some point. You’ll learn a valuable lesson about perseverance and your capabilities.

2. View growth as a process

Our accomplishments or failures don’t define our experiences. When you can embrace the whole journey with all its obstacles and hitches, you’ll become more comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Lots of us tend to be very focused on end results, which sometimes blinkers us to the baby steps that even pros take to get there.

3. Set your own pace

Try engaging with learning experiences and accepting them for what they are. Everyone learns, fails, and grows at their own pace, and you are your own person. Whether it’s mastering a new skill or conquering a long-standing fear, you’ll get there; remind yourself of that.

What works for one person won’t work for another. With hard work and dedication, you’ll find a pathway that works for you.

4. Everyone fails

Everyone makes mistakes. To nurture a growth mindset, you can start by acknowledging this, then accepting it. You’re not the first one to slip up, and it doesn’t define who you are; others have been there before you. Keep going, trust in yourself, and look within yourself for validation, not outside. Be realistic.

5. Develop resilience

This one is closely related to the above: to fail and keep trying requires resilience. To keep going in the face of adversity, it’s important to practice self-compassion, mental toughness, and be your own best friend. When we take failure as a given, we grant ourselves the freedom and space to try again. This theory of resilience training is a useful way to develop your capacity to deal with difficulties.

So, can you develop a growth mindset? Have you tried one of the online assessments we’ve linked to? Or perhaps, you’re an educator interested in helping your students become more resilient when dealing with problems. Wherever your interest lies, Dweck’s mindset theory gives us a lot to think about.

Research suggests that with the right attitude, we can improve the way we deal with life’s difficulties. If you’ve found any of this material useful for yourself or your practice, let us know. Leave your comments below and share your thoughts with us!

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free .

• Blackwell, L. S., Trzesniewski, K. H., & Dweck, C. S. (2007). Implicit theories of intelligence predict achievement across an adolescent transition: A longitudinal study and an intervention. Child Development, 78 (1), 246–263.
• Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House.
• Dweck, C. S. (2012). Mindsets and human nature: Promoting change in the Middle East, the schoolyard, the racial divide, and willpower. American Psychologist, 67 (8), 614–622.
• Murphy, M. C., & Dweck, C. S. (2016). Mindsets shape consumer behavior. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 26 (1), 127–136.
• P’Pool, K. (2012). Using Dweck’s theory of motivation to determine how a student’s view of intelligence affects their overall academic achievement (Master’s thesis, Western Kentucky University). Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.wku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2217&context=theses
• Pawlina, S., & Stanford, C. (2011). Preschoolers grow their brains: Shifting mindsets for greater resiliency and better problem solving. YC Young Children, 66 (5), 30–36.
• Yeager, D. S., Hanselman, P., Walton, G. M., Murray, J. S., Crosnoe, R., Muller, C., … Paunesku, D. (2019). A national experiment reveals where a growth mindset improves achievement. Nature , 573 (7774), 364–369.

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The article was very informative and it will be both useful at work and at home when coaching my children

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Developing a problem solving mindset

By   Carthage

August 22, 2014

Whether you are trying to improve your productivity, improve the quality of your relationships or, resolve conflict; there is one critical factor which is often overlooked – a problem solving mindset. A problem solving mindset is essential in almost every area of life. Even with the best planning and preparation, things will go wrong for you. When this happens, your problem solving mindset will enable you to find the best path forward. You will be able to achieve your objectives quicker, help others to find solutions to their problems and, reduce conflict and stress. When you have an effective problem solving mindset, you become a valuable resource for friends, family and colleagues. Even in the most pressurised of situations, you will be seen as an ally rather than a threat.

Critical aspects of a problem solving mindset

The following skills are critical aspects of a problem solving mindset. As you start to implement these skills, and improve your ability with them, you will see large improvements in the results that you achieve.

1. Responsibility

Responsibility is both a skill and an attitude. When you encounter a problem in your life, you can either bury your head in the sand or, you can choose to do something proactive about the situation. Sadly, many choose the first option but avoidance is not an effective problem solving skill . When you choose to ignore a problem; it doesn’t go away. Instead, it builds up in the background until eventually; you are forced to deal with it.

With a problem solving mindset, you know that if you do not attempt to deal with the problem; you are creating a bigger problem which, when you are eventually forced to deal with it; it will be more difficult to resolve successfully. Therefore, when you see a problem, you are eager and willing to step up and attempt to resolve the situation.

2. Emotional intelligence

When things go wrong, it is easy to lose control of your emotions. You may become angry or distraught due to things not going as expected. It is important that you feel and experience your emotions but it is just as important that you do not choose your next action based on these emotions. Your emotions are so powerful that they can influence you to take decisions and actions that you would not otherwise consider. An essential component of an effective problem solving mindset is the ability to take ownership of your emotions and then, centre yourself and regain your composure, prior to choosing your response to the situation.

Dr. Steve Peter’s excellent book ‘The Chimp Paradox: The Mind Management Program to Help You Achieve Success, Confidence, and Happiness’, will give you an excellent overview of this.

3. Goal identification

You would be amazed at how many people I have met over the years who, when faced with a problem, rush straight in to trying to solve the problem before they have decided on the outcome they desire. When you are trying to solve a problem, you must first understand the true nature of the problem . Then, you must decide what solution you would like to achieve i.e. what is the end goal of the problem solving process. If you have no idea of the outcome you are trying to achieve; you will not solve the problem, you will merely change the problem.

Once you have developed a problem solving mindset, you will realise that you need to stand back and analyse a problem before you rush in to solve it. You will then enter the problem solving phase with a clear understanding of what is wrong, what it is costing you and, what you would like to achieve as a result of your efforts. With this approach, your chances of success are greatly elevated.

You can learn more about idenitifying and setting effective goals with the Ultimate Guide to Goal Setting .

4. Descriptive and objective detail

One of the biggest obstacles to problem solving is the apportioning of blame. When you use the language of blame, others take offence and go on the defensive. They are then less likely to engage in any attempts to resolve the situation. To prevent this from happening, it is imperative that you be able to give an accurate, detailed account of what has occurred. If you are unsure of some of the details, say so. Do not try to fill the gap with assumptions as somebody is likely to offer a contrary view, thus leading to an unnecessary argument.

5. Active listening

When I first entered the working world, the term ‘active listening ’ was really taking off. However, the teaching on this area seemed to focus on the need to let the other person know that you are listening; with verbal and physical gestures e.g. nodding your head. However, I have always found that there is a simpler way to practice active listening – listen.

When you genuinely listen to people, and take an interest in what they say, this communicates itself to the person speaking. You will naturally begin to do verbal and physical gestures. You will also find that you are inclined to ask questions and reflect. When you listen actively, the speaker feels valued and appreciated thus encouraging them to be more open, trustworthy and helpful as you try to resolve the problem.

6. Probe and reflect

So, active listening is not just listening. It is listening and, supporting that listening with questions and reflections, with the purpose of gathering as much information about the problem as possible. When you are listening, you may be confused about something that you have heard or, you may wish to learn a little more about something which was mentioned. This is the ideal time to ask a question or two, so that you may probe a little further.

When you develop a problem solving mindset, you realise that there is thinking that you understand and, ensuring that you understand. You don’t settle for thinking that you understand. Instead, you use reflection to tell the speaker your understanding of what they have told you. This is important because it provides them with the opportunity to correct any misunderstandings. This ensures that you can pursue a solution based on facts rather than miscommunications.

7. Desire to find the most appropriate solution

Too often, when trying to solve a problem, people jump at the first solution that comes into their head. In my experience, the first solution is rarely the best or most appropriate solution. It is best to take a period of time to generate as many potential solutions as possible. Invite all of the relevant stakeholders to offer their thoughts. Then, together, you can evaluate each potential solution to determine which one is most likely to bring about the conclusion that you are seeking.

Effective communication skills are an essential part of a problem solving mindset. You can learn more with How To Talk So Others Will Listen .

A problem solving mindset is crucial in every walk of life. When you have a problem solving mindset you understand the difference between actually solving the problem and, merely changing the nature of the problem. When you have a problem solving mindset you have a range of skills and attributes which enable you to find the most appropriate solution to implement, in order to bring about the desired change. As you implement these skills and gain confidence in your ability to use them, you will deal with any problems that may arise, quicker and more effectively. As a consequence, you will improve the quality of the results that you achieve in all areas of your life.

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What is a problem-solving mindset?

• Better decision-making:  A problem-solving mindset helps managers analyze problems more effectively and generate various possible solutions. This leads to more informed decision-making , which is critical for effective leadership.
• Improved productivity:  By addressing problems proactively, managers can prevent potential obstacles from becoming major issues that impact productivity . A problem-solving mindset can help managers to anticipate and prevent problems before they occur, leading to smoother operations and higher productivity.
• Enhanced teamwork:  Encouraging a problem-solving mindset among team members fosters a culture of collaboration and encourages open communication. This can lead to stronger teamwork , as team members are more likely to work together to identify and solve problems.
• Improved morale:  When managers take a proactive approach to problem-solving, they demonstrate their commitment to their team’s success. This can improve morale and build trust and respect between managers and team members.
• Better outcomes:  Ultimately, a problem solving mindset leads to better outcomes. By effectively identifying and addressing problems, managers can improve processes, reduce costs, and enhance overall performance.
• Acknowledge the issue:   Instead of avoiding or dismissing the problem, the first step in adopting a problem-solving mindset is to embrace it. Accept the problem and commit to trying to find a solution.
• Focus on the solutions:  Shift your attention from the problem to the solution by concentrating on it. Then, work towards the result by visualizing it.
• Come up with all possible solutions:  Create a list of all potential answers, even those that appear unusual or out of the ordinary. Avoid dismissing ideas prematurely and encourage creative thinking.
• Analyze the root cause:  After coming up with a list of viable solutions. Finding the fundamental reason enables you to solve the problem and stop it from happening again.
• Take on a new perspective:  Sometimes, a new viewpoint might result in game-breakthrough solutions.  Consider looking at the problem differently, considering other people’s perspectives, or questioning your presumptions.
• Implement solutions and monitor them:    Choose the best course of action, then implement it. Keep an eye on the findings and make changes as needed. Use what you learn from the process to sharpen your problem-solving skills.

• Positive attitude:  A problem-solving manager approaches challenges with a positive and proactive mindset, focused on solutions rather than problems.
• Analytical thinking:  A problem-solving manager breaks down complex challenges into smaller, more manageable pieces and identifies the underlying causes of difficulties because of their strong analytical skills .
• Creativity:  A manager with a problem solving mindset think outside the box to solve difficulties and problems.
• Flexibility:  A manager with a problem-solving mindset can change their problem-solving strategy depending on the circumstances. They are receptive to new ideas and other viewpoints.
• Collaboration:  A manager who prioritizes problem-solving understands the value of collaboration and teamwork. They value team members’ feedback and are skilled at bringing diverse perspectives together to develop creative solutions.
• Strategic thinking:  A problem-solving manager thinks strategically , considering the long-term consequences of their decisions and solutions. They can balance short-term fixes with long-term objectives.
• Continuous improvement:  A problem-solving manager is dedicated to continuous improvement, always looking for new ways to learn and improve their problem-solving skills. They use feedback and analysis to improve their approach and achieve better results.
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• A manager listens actively to a team member’s concerns and identifies the root cause of a problem before brainstorming potential solutions.
• A manager encourages team members to collaborate and share ideas to solve a challenging problem.
• A manager takes a proactive approach to address potential obstacles, anticipating challenges and taking steps to prevent them from becoming major issues.
• A manager analyzes data and feedback to identify patterns and insights that can inform more effective problem-solving.
• A manager uses various tools and techniques, such as brainstorming , SWOT analysis, or root cause analysis, to identify and address problems.
• To inform about problem-solving, a manager seeks input and feedback from various sources, including team members, stakeholders, and subject matter experts.
• A manager encourages experimentation and risk-taking, fostering a culture of innovation and creativity.
• A manager takes ownership of problems rather than blaming others or deflecting responsibility.
• A manager is willing to admit mistakes and learn from failures rather than become defensive or dismissive.
• A manager focuses on finding solutions rather than dwelling on problems or obstacles.
• A manager can adapt and pivot as needed, being flexible and responsive to changing circumstances or new information.

Suprabha Sharma

Suprabha, a versatile professional who blends expertise in human resources and psychology, bridges the divide between people management and personal growth with her novel perspectives at Risely. Her experience as a human resource professional has empowered her to visualize practical solutions for frequent managerial challenges that form the pivot of her writings.

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Mindset: The hidden essential for problem solving

September 16, 2022 by Jim Connolly

Much ink has been spilled over the years, regarding problem solving. The majority of which focuses on strategies and tactics. Far less attention has been given to the importance of your mindset.

Mindset is the essential foundation of problem solving. It’s the very base that will support (or collapse) any strategies or tactics you use. In short, if your mindset isn’t right, strategies and tactics are pointless.

To help redress the mindset imbalance, I’d like to share a few ideas to help you overcome your next challenge / problem.

Mindset presupposition

Part of building the most effective problem solving mindset, is to presuppose there’s an answer.

Not only an answer, but a great answer.

However, people will often only try a problem solving strategy, after failing to swiftly find the answer the need. This can lead to doubt; especially if it’s a major problem. And doubt tends to lead to circular, negative thinking. It places you in a toxic mindset, making it extremely hard to find the solution.

Here’s an example of circular, negative thinking. Imagine John has just learned he’s about to be laid-off from his job. His thinking may look something like this.

• If I don’t quickly find a new job, I’ll end up broke.
• What will happen if we can’t pay the rent?
• Well, I have some savings. That will last for a while. Maybe long enough for me to find a job.
• But what if I don’t find a new job quickly enough? (Circling back to the first point).

No matter how good John’s problem solving strategy is, that mindset will massively reduce the likelihood of a great outcome. It will simply heap increasing levels of unhelpful stress on him. This, in turn, makes it even harder for him to focus optimally on the answer he needs.

Clearly, a more effective and efficient mindset is required.

Improving your mindset for problem solving

If you’ve ever tried telling yourself to “think positive”, you’ll know it seldom, if ever, works. Especially when you’re mindset is already in a negative / stressful state. The mind is complex. It knows when you’re bullshitting yourself.

Well, it would, wouldn’t it !?!

The answer? Drop the bullshit and let the facts of your situation inspire your thinking and improve your mindset.

To demonstrate this, I’ll use John’s example again. Here are just a few real-world facts he could focus on, which would massively improve his mindset.

• Every minute of every day, people in his situation are being hired.
• There are countless examples of people like John, whose lives were enriched beyond recognition, after being forced to find a new job or career.
• We live in the era of free, global communications. This means it’s the best time ever to connect with people, who can hire him or help him get hired.
• People who’ve overcome the same problem as John, have shared their experiences all over the internet. So, he’ll be able to learn from them.
• And John will never be more than one call, one email or one meeting away from the person or company who will hire him.

You get the idea.

That type of real-world thinking is easier for your mind to accept, because it’s based on facts. And when your mind accepts a solution-focused reality, your mindset is in a highly effective state .

Now, you have the mindset foundation in place, to find and implement a problem solving strategy, successfully.

Mindset Mastery: Keys to Effective Problem-Solving

The art of problem-solving is not merely an intellectual exercise but a holistic approach that encompasses one's mindset, emotions, and behaviors. Mindset Mastery in problem-solving is the cornerstone of personal and professional success. It is the catalyst that transforms challenging situations into opportunities for growth and innovation.

This article delves into the intricate relationship between a person’s mindset and their ability to solve problems effectively. We define the problem-solving mindset as a complex fusion of resilience, open-mindedness, and the tenacious pursuit of solutions amidst adversity. At its core, a problem-solving mindset is the unwavering belief that one can navigate through problems by developing skills and strategies conducive to mastering challenges.

The Psychology of Problem-Solving

Understanding Cognitive Approaches: Cognitive approaches in problem-solving are quintessential in determining the efficacy of the solutions derived. These frameworks create a structure within which problems can be dissected and examined from various angles. Analytical thinking, which involves systematic and logical reasoning, forms the bedrock of this cognitive methodology. However, it is the amalgamation of analytical and creative thinking that truly propels problem-solving to its peak. Creative thought processes encourage the exploration of non-conventional solutions, allowing for a comprehensive and often novel resolution.

Emotional Intelligence in Problem-Solving: Within the labyrinth of problem-solving lies the critical element of emotional intelligence – the capability to identify, assess, and manage emotions. Processing emotional responses can have a profound impact on decision-making. It allows for a level-headed approach that is less prone to biases and distortions, leading to effective problem-solving . Emotional intelligence also enables individuals to communicate better and collaborate effectively, especially in group problem-solving contexts.

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Keys to Problem-Solving Mastery

Cultivating a Growth Mindset: The dichotomy of growth versus fixed mindsets has significant implications for problem-solving. Individuals with growth mindsets view challenges as stepping stones to mastery; they believe abilities can be honed with effort and perseverance. This mentality facilitates an adaptive and agile approach to problem-solving, as it fosters resilience and a willingness to engage in continuous learning.

Embracing Challenges as Opportunities: To dominate the realm of problem-solving, one must reframe challenges as opportunities for growth. This shift in perspective minimizes the fear of failure and inspires individuals to experiment with novel strategies. Such a paradigm encourages learning from failures and setbacks, which is an essential component for achieving mastery in problem-solving .

Developing Effective Problem-Solving Skills

Enhancing Critical Thinking: Critical analysis is an indispensable element of problem-solving. To strengthen this faculty, individuals must engage in targeted strategies that challenge their reasoning abilities. This may include problem-solving courses free of charge available online or systematic practice through intellectual pursuits. Sharpening critical thinking abilities complements other problem-solving skills by laying a strong foundation of logical analysis.

Creative Solution Generation: Innovation and creativity are jewels in the crown of problem-solving. They drive the generation of unique solutions that can outpace traditional methods. Encouraging out-of-the-box thinking requires cultivating an environment where brainstorming and experimentation are embraced. Techniques that push the boundaries of conventional paradigms contribute to the growth of creative proficiency.

Applying the Problem-Solving Mindset in Real-Life Scenarios

Case Studies: Analyzing real-life case studies can substantially augment one's understanding of practical problem-solving. These provide rich narratives showcasing the application of various problem-solving principals in tangible situations. By observing the mindset of individuals who have navigated complex issues successfully, one can glean insights into effective mindset strategies.

Interactive Scenarios: The true testament of having acquired a problem-solving mindset is the ability to apply it to real-world problems. Interactive scenarios, which may be found in comprehensive online courses like an online MBA course , provide a fertile ground for practicing the theories and techniques discussed in this manuscript. Engaging with these scenarios hones one's problem-solving skills, ensuring they become second nature.

Mastery in Problem-Solving: Continuous Improvement

Reflective Practices: Reflection is a catalyst for growth in problem-solving. By embedding reflective practices into one's daily routine, individuals can continuously refine their problem-solving methods. Tools such as journals, mind-maps, or reflection sessions can assist in evaluating the process and outcomes of problem-solving activities.

Lifelong Learning and Adaptability: In an ever-evolving world, adaptability is crucial. The commitment to lifelong learning ensures that one's problem-solving skills do not plateau but instead continue to advance. It is through this persistent endeavor that individuals maintain their edge in problem-solving, adapting to new challenges effectively.

Recognizing the indispensable role of mindset in effective problem-solving is the essence of true mastery. This article has traversed through various dimensions of mindset and its pivotal impact on solving problems. The journey towards enhancing problem-solving skills is both challenging and rewarding, and it is incumbent upon readers to dedicate themselves to this pursuit.

What are the most effective strategies for mastering a problem-solving mindset?

Problem-solving mindset: strategies for mastery, understanding the mindset.

To solve problems effectively, one requires a particular mindset. This mindset embraces challenges, tolerates ambiguity, and persists despite setbacks. It involves creativity and critical thinking. Cultivating this mindset is crucial for success in various aspects of life.

Strategy 1: Embrace Challenges

First, one must seek out challenges. Comfort often impedes growth. By stepping out of one’s comfort zone, one strengthens problem-solving muscles. This involves accepting complex tasks. It demands willingness to fail and learn.

Strategy 2: Develop Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is paramount. This involves questioning assumptions. It includes evaluating evidence and reasoning. One must practice breaking down arguments. Looking at situations from multiple viewpoints is essential. This broadens one's thinking horizon.

Strategy 3: Enhance Creativity

Creativity is a key problem-solving skill. Practicing brainstorming helps. So does keeping an idea journal. One can draw inspiration from diverse fields. It pays to challenge conventional wisdom. This unlocks innovative solutions.

Strategy 4: Learn from Others

Learning from peers and mentors is invaluable. Collaboration often leads to better solutions. It unites diverse skills and perspectives. One should engage in constructive debates. These exchanges sharpen one’s mind.

Strategy 5: Reflect and Adapt

Reflection is a powerful tool. After each problem, one should reflect. This involves analyzing what worked and what did not. It is important to adapt future strategies accordingly. Mastery requires continuous refinement.

Strategy 6: Develop Persistence

Persistence is crucial in developing problem-solving skills. Obstacles are inevitable. Persisting teaches resilience. One must remain focused on the end goal. This fosters a strong problem-solving mindset.

Strategy 7: Set Incremental Goals

Setting incremental goals helps. This means breaking big problems into smaller parts. It makes complex problems more manageable. Achieving these smaller milestones builds confidence. It reinforces a positive approach to challenges.

Strategy 8: Practice Regularly

Like any skill, problem-solving improves with practice. Regular exercises and challenges hone one’s abilities. There are various puzzles and logical problems available for practice. Commitment to daily practice is vital.

Mastering the problem-solving mindset comprises various strategies. It involves embracing challenges and failing forward. One sharpens critical thinking and creativity. Learning from others and collaboration enrich one's approach. Reflecting, adapting, and persisting are key. Setting incremental goals and practicing regularly are also essential. With these strategies, individuals can develop robust problem-solving capabilities.

How does mindset influence the problem-solving process?

Mindset and problem-solving, definitions matter.

Mindset shapes perception. It influences behavior. Carol Dweck explains this well. She distinguishes between fixed and growth mindsets. The former sees abilities as static. The latter views skills as malleable.

Impact on Approach

A fixed mindset limits. It avoids challenges. It fears failure. A growth mindset embraces difficulties. It perseveres through setbacks. It learns from criticism. Thus, mindset sets the stage for problem-solving.

Handling Challenges

With a fixed mindset, individuals shun complex problems. They prefer the familiar. This hinders creative solutions. In contrast, a growth mindset cultivates resilience. It encourages innovative thinking. It approaches obstacles with optimism.

Strategies and Techniques

Mindset influences strategy choice. A fixed mindset might select safe, known methods. It runs from risks. A growth mindset seeks diverse options. It considers multiple perspectives. It values the learning process.

Adaptability and Flexibility

Problem-solving requires adaptability. Fixed mindsets struggle here. They prefer predictability. Growth mindsets excel in adaptability. They pivot as needed. They reframe problems effectively.

Collaboration and Feedback

Problems often need teamwork. A fixed mindset may resist collaboration. It views aid as weakness. Conversely, a growth mindset values input. It appreciates different viewpoints. It utilizes collective intelligence.

Outcomes and Responses

Reactions to outcomes vary by mindset. A fixed mindset despairs over failure. It cannot separate effort from ability. A growth mindset learns from outcomes. It acknowledges effort. It refines approaches accordingly.

Long-term Effects

A growth mindset leads to continuous improvement. It sees problems as learning chances. It enhances lifelong skills. A fixed mindset stagnates. It avoids growth opportunities. It yields fewer personal advancements.

In sum, mindset deeply influences how we solve problems. It affects approach, adaptability, and outcomes. Cultivating a growth mindset can greatly enhance problem-solving abilities.

Can mindset mastery significantly improve my problem-solving skills?

Can mindset mastery improve problem-solving skills, understanding mindset.

Mindset shapes perception . It steers actions. Experts agree on its importance. Carol Dweck introduced mindset distinctions. She highlights fixed and growth mindsets.

Fixed vs. Growth Mindset

A fixed mindset limits possibilities. Challenges become threats. Effort seems futile. Growth mindset differs greatly. Challenges are opportunities. Effort is the path to mastery.

Mindset mastery fosters enhanced problem-solving skills. Here's how:

Persistence : Growth mindset encourages perseverance.

Resilience : Setbacks become learning experiences.

Adaptability : Flexible thinking arises.

Innovation : Creative solutions are welcomed.

Open-mindedness : Different perspectives get consideration.

Embracing Challenges

View problems as puzzles. This shift matters. It turns anxiety into curiosity.

Process Over Outcome

Focus on learning . Mastery comes from process. Outcomes improve as a result.

Feedback and Growth

Seek constructive criticism . Feedback fuels improvement. It transforms problem-solving ability.

incremental Progress

Celebrate small victories. They add up. They lead to significant improvements.

Collaborative Problem-Solving

Collaborate with others . Different viewpoints enhance solutions. Teamwork broadens thinking.

Yes, mindset mastery can improve problem-solving. It requires dedication. Change does not happen overnight. Practice fosters growth. Cultivate a growth mindset. Watch your problem-solving skills transform.

He is a content producer who specializes in blog content. He has a master's degree in business administration and he lives in the Netherlands.

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All teams and organizations encounter challenges as they grow. There are problems that might occur for teams when it comes to miscommunication or resolving business-critical issues . You may face challenges around growth , design , user engagement, and even team culture and happiness. In short, problem-solving techniques should be part of every team’s skillset.

Problem-solving methods are primarily designed to help a group or team through a process of first identifying problems and challenges , ideating possible solutions , and then evaluating the most suitable .

Finding effective solutions to complex problems isn’t easy, but by using the right process and techniques, you can help your team be more efficient in the process.

So how do you develop strategies that are engaging, and empower your team to solve problems effectively?

In this blog post, we share a series of problem-solving tools you can use in your next workshop or team meeting. You’ll also find some tips for facilitating the process and how to enable others to solve complex problems.

Let’s get started! 

How do you identify problems?

How do you identify the right solution.

• Tips for more effective problem-solving

Complete problem-solving methods

• Problem-solving techniques to identify and analyze problems
• Problem-solving techniques for developing solutions

Problem-solving warm-up activities

Closing activities for a problem-solving process.

Before you can move towards finding the right solution for a given problem, you first need to identify and define the problem you wish to solve. 

Here, you want to clearly articulate what the problem is and allow your group to do the same. Remember that everyone in a group is likely to have differing perspectives and alignment is necessary in order to help the group move forward. 

Identifying a problem accurately also requires that all members of a group are able to contribute their views in an open and safe manner. It can be scary for people to stand up and contribute, especially if the problems or challenges are emotive or personal in nature. Be sure to try and create a psychologically safe space for these kinds of discussions.

Remember that problem analysis and further discussion are also important. Not taking the time to fully analyze and discuss a challenge can result in the development of solutions that are not fit for purpose or do not address the underlying issue.

Successfully identifying and then analyzing a problem means facilitating a group through activities designed to help them clearly and honestly articulate their thoughts and produce usable insight.

With this data, you might then produce a problem statement that clearly describes the problem you wish to be addressed and also state the goal of any process you undertake to tackle this issue.  

Finding solutions is the end goal of any process. Complex organizational challenges can only be solved with an appropriate solution but discovering them requires using the right problem-solving tool.

After you’ve explored a problem and discussed ideas, you need to help a team discuss and choose the right solution. Consensus tools and methods such as those below help a group explore possible solutions before then voting for the best. They’re a great way to tap into the collective intelligence of the group for great results!

Remember that the process is often iterative. Great problem solvers often roadtest a viable solution in a measured way to see what works too. While you might not get the right solution on your first try, the methods below help teams land on the most likely to succeed solution while also holding space for improvement.

Every effective problem solving process begins with an agenda . A well-structured workshop is one of the best methods for successfully guiding a group from exploring a problem to implementing a solution.

In SessionLab, it’s easy to go from an idea to a complete agenda . Start by dragging and dropping your core problem solving activities into place . Add timings, breaks and necessary materials before sharing your agenda with your colleagues.

The resulting agenda will be your guide to an effective and productive problem solving session that will also help you stay organized on the day!

Tips for more effective problem solving

Problem-solving activities are only one part of the puzzle. While a great method can help unlock your team’s ability to solve problems, without a thoughtful approach and strong facilitation the solutions may not be fit for purpose.

Let’s take a look at some problem-solving tips you can apply to any process to help it be a success!

Clearly define the problem

Jumping straight to solutions can be tempting, though without first clearly articulating a problem, the solution might not be the right one. Many of the problem-solving activities below include sections where the problem is explored and clearly defined before moving on.

This is a vital part of the problem-solving process and taking the time to fully define an issue can save time and effort later. A clear definition helps identify irrelevant information and it also ensures that your team sets off on the right track.

Don’t jump to conclusions

It’s easy for groups to exhibit cognitive bias or have preconceived ideas about both problems and potential solutions. Be sure to back up any problem statements or potential solutions with facts, research, and adequate forethought.

The best techniques ask participants to be methodical and challenge preconceived notions. Make sure you give the group enough time and space to collect relevant information and consider the problem in a new way. By approaching the process with a clear, rational mindset, you’ll often find that better solutions are more forthcoming.  

Try different approaches  

Problems come in all shapes and sizes and so too should the methods you use to solve them. If you find that one approach isn’t yielding results and your team isn’t finding different solutions, try mixing it up. You’ll be surprised at how using a new creative activity can unblock your team and generate great solutions.

Don’t take it personally 

Depending on the nature of your team or organizational problems, it’s easy for conversations to get heated. While it’s good for participants to be engaged in the discussions, ensure that emotions don’t run too high and that blame isn’t thrown around while finding solutions.

You’re all in it together, and even if your team or area is seeing problems, that isn’t necessarily a disparagement of you personally. Using facilitation skills to manage group dynamics is one effective method of helping conversations be more constructive.

Get the right people in the room

Your problem-solving method is often only as effective as the group using it. Getting the right people on the job and managing the number of people present is important too!

If the group is too small, you may not get enough different perspectives to effectively solve a problem. If the group is too large, you can go round and round during the ideation stages.

Creating the right group makeup is also important in ensuring you have the necessary expertise and skillset to both identify and follow up on potential solutions. Carefully consider who to include at each stage to help ensure your problem-solving method is followed and positioned for success.

Document everything

The best solutions can take refinement, iteration, and reflection to come out. Get into a habit of documenting your process in order to keep all the learnings from the session and to allow ideas to mature and develop. Many of the methods below involve the creation of documents or shared resources. Be sure to keep and share these so everyone can benefit from the work done!

Bring a facilitator 

Facilitation is all about making group processes easier. With a subject as potentially emotive and important as problem-solving, having an impartial third party in the form of a facilitator can make all the difference in finding great solutions and keeping the process moving. Consider bringing a facilitator to your problem-solving session to get better results and generate meaningful solutions!

Develop your problem-solving skills

It takes time and practice to be an effective problem solver. While some roles or participants might more naturally gravitate towards problem-solving, it can take development and planning to help everyone create better solutions.

You might develop a training program, run a problem-solving workshop or simply ask your team to practice using the techniques below. Check out our post on problem-solving skills to see how you and your group can develop the right mental process and be more resilient to issues too!

Design a great agenda

Workshops are a great format for solving problems. With the right approach, you can focus a group and help them find the solutions to their own problems. But designing a process can be time-consuming and finding the right activities can be difficult.

Check out our workshop planning guide to level-up your agenda design and start running more effective workshops. Need inspiration? Check out templates designed by expert facilitators to help you kickstart your process!

In this section, we’ll look at in-depth problem-solving methods that provide a complete end-to-end process for developing effective solutions. These will help guide your team from the discovery and definition of a problem through to delivering the right solution.

If you’re looking for an all-encompassing method or problem-solving model, these processes are a great place to start. They’ll ask your team to challenge preconceived ideas and adopt a mindset for solving problems more effectively.

• Six Thinking Hats
• Lightning Decision Jam
• Problem Definition Process
• Discovery & Action Dialogue

Design Sprint 2.0

• Open Space Technology

1. Six Thinking Hats

Individual approaches to solving a problem can be very different based on what team or role an individual holds. It can be easy for existing biases or perspectives to find their way into the mix, or for internal politics to direct a conversation.

Six Thinking Hats is a classic method for identifying the problems that need to be solved and enables your team to consider them from different angles, whether that is by focusing on facts and data, creative solutions, or by considering why a particular solution might not work.

Like all problem-solving frameworks, Six Thinking Hats is effective at helping teams remove roadblocks from a conversation or discussion and come to terms with all the aspects necessary to solve complex problems.

2. Lightning Decision Jam

Featured courtesy of Jonathan Courtney of AJ&Smart Berlin, Lightning Decision Jam is one of those strategies that should be in every facilitation toolbox. Exploring problems and finding solutions is often creative in nature, though as with any creative process, there is the potential to lose focus and get lost.

Unstructured discussions might get you there in the end, but it’s much more effective to use a method that creates a clear process and team focus.

In Lightning Decision Jam, participants are invited to begin by writing challenges, concerns, or mistakes on post-its without discussing them before then being invited by the moderator to present them to the group.

From there, the team vote on which problems to solve and are guided through steps that will allow them to reframe those problems, create solutions and then decide what to execute on. 

By deciding the problems that need to be solved as a team before moving on, this group process is great for ensuring the whole team is aligned and can take ownership over the next stages. 

Lightning Decision Jam (LDJ)   #action   #decision making   #problem solving   #issue analysis   #innovation   #design   #remote-friendly   The problem with anything that requires creative thinking is that it’s easy to get lost—lose focus and fall into the trap of having useless, open-ended, unstructured discussions. Here’s the most effective solution I’ve found: Replace all open, unstructured discussion with a clear process. What to use this exercise for: Anything which requires a group of people to make decisions, solve problems or discuss challenges. It’s always good to frame an LDJ session with a broad topic, here are some examples: The conversion flow of our checkout Our internal design process How we organise events Keeping up with our competition Improving sales flow

3. Problem Definition Process

While problems can be complex, the problem-solving methods you use to identify and solve those problems can often be simple in design. 

By taking the time to truly identify and define a problem before asking the group to reframe the challenge as an opportunity, this method is a great way to enable change.

Begin by identifying a focus question and exploring the ways in which it manifests before splitting into five teams who will each consider the problem using a different method: escape, reversal, exaggeration, distortion or wishful. Teams develop a problem objective and create ideas in line with their method before then feeding them back to the group.

This method is great for enabling in-depth discussions while also creating space for finding creative solutions too!

Problem Definition   #problem solving   #idea generation   #creativity   #online   #remote-friendly   A problem solving technique to define a problem, challenge or opportunity and to generate ideas.

4. The 5 Whys 

Sometimes, a group needs to go further with their strategies and analyze the root cause at the heart of organizational issues. An RCA or root cause analysis is the process of identifying what is at the heart of business problems or recurring challenges. 

The 5 Whys is a simple and effective method of helping a group go find the root cause of any problem or challenge and conduct analysis that will deliver results. 

By beginning with the creation of a problem statement and going through five stages to refine it, The 5 Whys provides everything you need to truly discover the cause of an issue.

The 5 Whys   #hyperisland   #innovation   This simple and powerful method is useful for getting to the core of a problem or challenge. As the title suggests, the group defines a problems, then asks the question “why” five times, often using the resulting explanation as a starting point for creative problem solving.

5. World Cafe

World Cafe is a simple but powerful facilitation technique to help bigger groups to focus their energy and attention on solving complex problems.

World Cafe enables this approach by creating a relaxed atmosphere where participants are able to self-organize and explore topics relevant and important to them which are themed around a central problem-solving purpose. Create the right atmosphere by modeling your space after a cafe and after guiding the group through the method, let them take the lead!

Making problem-solving a part of your organization’s culture in the long term can be a difficult undertaking. More approachable formats like World Cafe can be especially effective in bringing people unfamiliar with workshops into the fold. 

World Cafe   #hyperisland   #innovation   #issue analysis   World Café is a simple yet powerful method, originated by Juanita Brown, for enabling meaningful conversations driven completely by participants and the topics that are relevant and important to them. Facilitators create a cafe-style space and provide simple guidelines. Participants then self-organize and explore a set of relevant topics or questions for conversation.

6. Discovery & Action Dialogue (DAD)

One of the best approaches is to create a safe space for a group to share and discover practices and behaviors that can help them find their own solutions.

With DAD, you can help a group choose which problems they wish to solve and which approaches they will take to do so. It’s great at helping remove resistance to change and can help get buy-in at every level too!

This process of enabling frontline ownership is great in ensuring follow-through and is one of the methods you will want in your toolbox as a facilitator.

Discovery & Action Dialogue (DAD)   #idea generation   #liberating structures   #action   #issue analysis   #remote-friendly   DADs make it easy for a group or community to discover practices and behaviors that enable some individuals (without access to special resources and facing the same constraints) to find better solutions than their peers to common problems. These are called positive deviant (PD) behaviors and practices. DADs make it possible for people in the group, unit, or community to discover by themselves these PD practices. DADs also create favorable conditions for stimulating participants’ creativity in spaces where they can feel safe to invent new and more effective practices. Resistance to change evaporates as participants are unleashed to choose freely which practices they will adopt or try and which problems they will tackle. DADs make it possible to achieve frontline ownership of solutions.

7. Design Sprint 2.0

Want to see how a team can solve big problems and move forward with prototyping and testing solutions in a few days? The Design Sprint 2.0 template from Jake Knapp, author of Sprint, is a complete agenda for a with proven results.

Developing the right agenda can involve difficult but necessary planning. Ensuring all the correct steps are followed can also be stressful or time-consuming depending on your level of experience.

Use this complete 4-day workshop template if you are finding there is no obvious solution to your challenge and want to focus your team around a specific problem that might require a shortcut to launching a minimum viable product or waiting for the organization-wide implementation of a solution.

8. Open space technology

Open space technology- developed by Harrison Owen – creates a space where large groups are invited to take ownership of their problem solving and lead individual sessions. Open space technology is a great format when you have a great deal of expertise and insight in the room and want to allow for different takes and approaches on a particular theme or problem you need to be solved.

Start by bringing your participants together to align around a central theme and focus their efforts. Explain the ground rules to help guide the problem-solving process and then invite members to identify any issue connecting to the central theme that they are interested in and are prepared to take responsibility for.

Once participants have decided on their approach to the core theme, they write their issue on a piece of paper, announce it to the group, pick a session time and place, and post the paper on the wall. As the wall fills up with sessions, the group is then invited to join the sessions that interest them the most and which they can contribute to, then you’re ready to begin!

Everyone joins the problem-solving group they’ve signed up to, record the discussion and if appropriate, findings can then be shared with the rest of the group afterward.

Open Space Technology   #action plan   #idea generation   #problem solving   #issue analysis   #large group   #online   #remote-friendly   Open Space is a methodology for large groups to create their agenda discerning important topics for discussion, suitable for conferences, community gatherings and whole system facilitation

Techniques to identify and analyze problems

Using a problem-solving method to help a team identify and analyze a problem can be a quick and effective addition to any workshop or meeting.

While further actions are always necessary, you can generate momentum and alignment easily, and these activities are a great place to get started.

We’ve put together this list of techniques to help you and your team with problem identification, analysis, and discussion that sets the foundation for developing effective solutions.

Let’s take a look!

• The Creativity Dice
• Fishbone Analysis
• Problem Tree
• SWOT Analysis
• Agreement-Certainty Matrix
• The Journalistic Six
• LEGO Challenge
• What, So What, Now What?
• Journalists

Individual and group perspectives are incredibly important, but what happens if people are set in their minds and need a change of perspective in order to approach a problem more effectively?

Flip It is a method we love because it is both simple to understand and run, and allows groups to understand how their perspectives and biases are formed. 

Participants in Flip It are first invited to consider concerns, issues, or problems from a perspective of fear and write them on a flip chart. Then, the group is asked to consider those same issues from a perspective of hope and flip their understanding.  

No problem and solution is free from existing bias and by changing perspectives with Flip It, you can then develop a problem solving model quickly and effectively.

Flip It!   #gamestorming   #problem solving   #action   Often, a change in a problem or situation comes simply from a change in our perspectives. Flip It! is a quick game designed to show players that perspectives are made, not born.

10. The Creativity Dice

One of the most useful problem solving skills you can teach your team is of approaching challenges with creativity, flexibility, and openness. Games like The Creativity Dice allow teams to overcome the potential hurdle of too much linear thinking and approach the process with a sense of fun and speed. 

In The Creativity Dice, participants are organized around a topic and roll a dice to determine what they will work on for a period of 3 minutes at a time. They might roll a 3 and work on investigating factual information on the chosen topic. They might roll a 1 and work on identifying the specific goals, standards, or criteria for the session.

Encouraging rapid work and iteration while asking participants to be flexible are great skills to cultivate. Having a stage for idea incubation in this game is also important. Moments of pause can help ensure the ideas that are put forward are the most suitable. 

The Creativity Dice   #creativity   #problem solving   #thiagi   #issue analysis   Too much linear thinking is hazardous to creative problem solving. To be creative, you should approach the problem (or the opportunity) from different points of view. You should leave a thought hanging in mid-air and move to another. This skipping around prevents premature closure and lets your brain incubate one line of thought while you consciously pursue another.

11. Fishbone Analysis

Organizational or team challenges are rarely simple, and it’s important to remember that one problem can be an indication of something that goes deeper and may require further consideration to be solved.

Fishbone Analysis helps groups to dig deeper and understand the origins of a problem. It’s a great example of a root cause analysis method that is simple for everyone on a team to get their head around. 

Participants in this activity are asked to annotate a diagram of a fish, first adding the problem or issue to be worked on at the head of a fish before then brainstorming the root causes of the problem and adding them as bones on the fish. 

Using abstractions such as a diagram of a fish can really help a team break out of their regular thinking and develop a creative approach.

Fishbone Analysis   #problem solving   ##root cause analysis   #decision making   #online facilitation   A process to help identify and understand the origins of problems, issues or observations.

12. Problem Tree 

Encouraging visual thinking can be an essential part of many strategies. By simply reframing and clarifying problems, a group can move towards developing a problem solving model that works for them. 

In Problem Tree, groups are asked to first brainstorm a list of problems – these can be design problems, team problems or larger business problems – and then organize them into a hierarchy. The hierarchy could be from most important to least important or abstract to practical, though the key thing with problem solving games that involve this aspect is that your group has some way of managing and sorting all the issues that are raised.

Once you have a list of problems that need to be solved and have organized them accordingly, you’re then well-positioned for the next problem solving steps.

Problem tree   #define intentions   #create   #design   #issue analysis   A problem tree is a tool to clarify the hierarchy of problems addressed by the team within a design project; it represents high level problems or related sublevel problems.

13. SWOT Analysis

Chances are you’ve heard of the SWOT Analysis before. This problem-solving method focuses on identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats is a tried and tested method for both individuals and teams.

Start by creating a desired end state or outcome and bare this in mind – any process solving model is made more effective by knowing what you are moving towards. Create a quadrant made up of the four categories of a SWOT analysis and ask participants to generate ideas based on each of those quadrants.

Once you have those ideas assembled in their quadrants, cluster them together based on their affinity with other ideas. These clusters are then used to facilitate group conversations and move things forward. 

SWOT analysis   #gamestorming   #problem solving   #action   #meeting facilitation   The SWOT Analysis is a long-standing technique of looking at what we have, with respect to the desired end state, as well as what we could improve on. It gives us an opportunity to gauge approaching opportunities and dangers, and assess the seriousness of the conditions that affect our future. When we understand those conditions, we can influence what comes next.

14. Agreement-Certainty Matrix

Not every problem-solving approach is right for every challenge, and deciding on the right method for the challenge at hand is a key part of being an effective team.

The Agreement Certainty matrix helps teams align on the nature of the challenges facing them. By sorting problems from simple to chaotic, your team can understand what methods are suitable for each problem and what they can do to ensure effective results. 

If you are already using Liberating Structures techniques as part of your problem-solving strategy, the Agreement-Certainty Matrix can be an invaluable addition to your process. We’ve found it particularly if you are having issues with recurring problems in your organization and want to go deeper in understanding the root cause. 

Agreement-Certainty Matrix   #issue analysis   #liberating structures   #problem solving   You can help individuals or groups avoid the frequent mistake of trying to solve a problem with methods that are not adapted to the nature of their challenge. The combination of two questions makes it possible to easily sort challenges into four categories: simple, complicated, complex , and chaotic .  A problem is simple when it can be solved reliably with practices that are easy to duplicate.  It is complicated when experts are required to devise a sophisticated solution that will yield the desired results predictably.  A problem is complex when there are several valid ways to proceed but outcomes are not predictable in detail.  Chaotic is when the context is too turbulent to identify a path forward.  A loose analogy may be used to describe these differences: simple is like following a recipe, complicated like sending a rocket to the moon, complex like raising a child, and chaotic is like the game “Pin the Tail on the Donkey.”  The Liberating Structures Matching Matrix in Chapter 5 can be used as the first step to clarify the nature of a challenge and avoid the mismatches between problems and solutions that are frequently at the root of chronic, recurring problems.

Organizing and charting a team’s progress can be important in ensuring its success. SQUID (Sequential Question and Insight Diagram) is a great model that allows a team to effectively switch between giving questions and answers and develop the skills they need to stay on track throughout the process. 

Begin with two different colored sticky notes – one for questions and one for answers – and with your central topic (the head of the squid) on the board. Ask the group to first come up with a series of questions connected to their best guess of how to approach the topic. Ask the group to come up with answers to those questions, fix them to the board and connect them with a line. After some discussion, go back to question mode by responding to the generated answers or other points on the board.

It’s rewarding to see a diagram grow throughout the exercise, and a completed SQUID can provide a visual resource for future effort and as an example for other teams.

SQUID   #gamestorming   #project planning   #issue analysis   #problem solving   When exploring an information space, it’s important for a group to know where they are at any given time. By using SQUID, a group charts out the territory as they go and can navigate accordingly. SQUID stands for Sequential Question and Insight Diagram.

16. Speed Boat

To continue with our nautical theme, Speed Boat is a short and sweet activity that can help a team quickly identify what employees, clients or service users might have a problem with and analyze what might be standing in the way of achieving a solution.

Methods that allow for a group to make observations, have insights and obtain those eureka moments quickly are invaluable when trying to solve complex problems.

In Speed Boat, the approach is to first consider what anchors and challenges might be holding an organization (or boat) back. Bonus points if you are able to identify any sharks in the water and develop ideas that can also deal with competitors!   

Speed Boat   #gamestorming   #problem solving   #action   Speedboat is a short and sweet way to identify what your employees or clients don’t like about your product/service or what’s standing in the way of a desired goal.

17. The Journalistic Six

Some of the most effective ways of solving problems is by encouraging teams to be more inclusive and diverse in their thinking.

Based on the six key questions journalism students are taught to answer in articles and news stories, The Journalistic Six helps create teams to see the whole picture. By using who, what, when, where, why, and how to facilitate the conversation and encourage creative thinking, your team can make sure that the problem identification and problem analysis stages of the are covered exhaustively and thoughtfully. Reporter’s notebook and dictaphone optional.

The Journalistic Six – Who What When Where Why How   #idea generation   #issue analysis   #problem solving   #online   #creative thinking   #remote-friendly   A questioning method for generating, explaining, investigating ideas.

18. LEGO Challenge

Now for an activity that is a little out of the (toy) box. LEGO Serious Play is a facilitation methodology that can be used to improve creative thinking and problem-solving skills. 

The LEGO Challenge includes giving each member of the team an assignment that is hidden from the rest of the group while they create a structure without speaking.

What the LEGO challenge brings to the table is a fun working example of working with stakeholders who might not be on the same page to solve problems. Also, it’s LEGO! Who doesn’t love LEGO! 

LEGO Challenge   #hyperisland   #team   A team-building activity in which groups must work together to build a structure out of LEGO, but each individual has a secret “assignment” which makes the collaborative process more challenging. It emphasizes group communication, leadership dynamics, conflict, cooperation, patience and problem solving strategy.

19. What, So What, Now What?

If not carefully managed, the problem identification and problem analysis stages of the problem-solving process can actually create more problems and misunderstandings.

The What, So What, Now What? problem-solving activity is designed to help collect insights and move forward while also eliminating the possibility of disagreement when it comes to identifying, clarifying, and analyzing organizational or work problems. 

Facilitation is all about bringing groups together so that might work on a shared goal and the best problem-solving strategies ensure that teams are aligned in purpose, if not initially in opinion or insight.

Throughout the three steps of this game, you give everyone on a team to reflect on a problem by asking what happened, why it is important, and what actions should then be taken. 

This can be a great activity for bringing our individual perceptions about a problem or challenge and contextualizing it in a larger group setting. This is one of the most important problem-solving skills you can bring to your organization.

W³ – What, So What, Now What?   #issue analysis   #innovation   #liberating structures   You can help groups reflect on a shared experience in a way that builds understanding and spurs coordinated action while avoiding unproductive conflict. It is possible for every voice to be heard while simultaneously sifting for insights and shaping new direction. Progressing in stages makes this practical—from collecting facts about What Happened to making sense of these facts with So What and finally to what actions logically follow with Now What . The shared progression eliminates most of the misunderstandings that otherwise fuel disagreements about what to do. Voila!

20. Journalists  

Problem analysis can be one of the most important and decisive stages of all problem-solving tools. Sometimes, a team can become bogged down in the details and are unable to move forward.

Journalists is an activity that can avoid a group from getting stuck in the problem identification or problem analysis stages of the process.

In Journalists, the group is invited to draft the front page of a fictional newspaper and figure out what stories deserve to be on the cover and what headlines those stories will have. By reframing how your problems and challenges are approached, you can help a team move productively through the process and be better prepared for the steps to follow.

Journalists   #vision   #big picture   #issue analysis   #remote-friendly   This is an exercise to use when the group gets stuck in details and struggles to see the big picture. Also good for defining a vision.

Problem-solving techniques for developing solutions 

The success of any problem-solving process can be measured by the solutions it produces. After you’ve defined the issue, explored existing ideas, and ideated, it’s time to narrow down to the correct solution.

Use these problem-solving techniques when you want to help your team find consensus, compare possible solutions, and move towards taking action on a particular problem.

• Improved Solutions
• Four-Step Sketch
• 15% Solutions
• How-Now-Wow matrix
• Impact Effort Matrix

21. Mindspin  

Brainstorming is part of the bread and butter of the problem-solving process and all problem-solving strategies benefit from getting ideas out and challenging a team to generate solutions quickly. 

With Mindspin, participants are encouraged not only to generate ideas but to do so under time constraints and by slamming down cards and passing them on. By doing multiple rounds, your team can begin with a free generation of possible solutions before moving on to developing those solutions and encouraging further ideation. 

This is one of our favorite problem-solving activities and can be great for keeping the energy up throughout the workshop. Remember the importance of helping people become engaged in the process – energizing problem-solving techniques like Mindspin can help ensure your team stays engaged and happy, even when the problems they’re coming together to solve are complex. 

MindSpin   #teampedia   #idea generation   #problem solving   #action   A fast and loud method to enhance brainstorming within a team. Since this activity has more than round ideas that are repetitive can be ruled out leaving more creative and innovative answers to the challenge.

22. Improved Solutions

After a team has successfully identified a problem and come up with a few solutions, it can be tempting to call the work of the problem-solving process complete. That said, the first solution is not necessarily the best, and by including a further review and reflection activity into your problem-solving model, you can ensure your group reaches the best possible result. 

One of a number of problem-solving games from Thiagi Group, Improved Solutions helps you go the extra mile and develop suggested solutions with close consideration and peer review. By supporting the discussion of several problems at once and by shifting team roles throughout, this problem-solving technique is a dynamic way of finding the best solution. 

Improved Solutions   #creativity   #thiagi   #problem solving   #action   #team   You can improve any solution by objectively reviewing its strengths and weaknesses and making suitable adjustments. In this creativity framegame, you improve the solutions to several problems. To maintain objective detachment, you deal with a different problem during each of six rounds and assume different roles (problem owner, consultant, basher, booster, enhancer, and evaluator) during each round. At the conclusion of the activity, each player ends up with two solutions to her problem.

23. Four Step Sketch

Creative thinking and visual ideation does not need to be confined to the opening stages of your problem-solving strategies. Exercises that include sketching and prototyping on paper can be effective at the solution finding and development stage of the process, and can be great for keeping a team engaged. 

By going from simple notes to a crazy 8s round that involves rapidly sketching 8 variations on their ideas before then producing a final solution sketch, the group is able to iterate quickly and visually. Problem-solving techniques like Four-Step Sketch are great if you have a group of different thinkers and want to change things up from a more textual or discussion-based approach.

Four-Step Sketch   #design sprint   #innovation   #idea generation   #remote-friendly   The four-step sketch is an exercise that helps people to create well-formed concepts through a structured process that includes: Review key information Start design work on paper,  Consider multiple variations , Create a detailed solution . This exercise is preceded by a set of other activities allowing the group to clarify the challenge they want to solve. See how the Four Step Sketch exercise fits into a Design Sprint

24. 15% Solutions

Some problems are simpler than others and with the right problem-solving activities, you can empower people to take immediate actions that can help create organizational change. 

Part of the liberating structures toolkit, 15% solutions is a problem-solving technique that focuses on finding and implementing solutions quickly. A process of iterating and making small changes quickly can help generate momentum and an appetite for solving complex problems.

Problem-solving strategies can live and die on whether people are onboard. Getting some quick wins is a great way of getting people behind the process.   

It can be extremely empowering for a team to realize that problem-solving techniques can be deployed quickly and easily and delineate between things they can positively impact and those things they cannot change. 

15% Solutions   #action   #liberating structures   #remote-friendly   You can reveal the actions, however small, that everyone can do immediately. At a minimum, these will create momentum, and that may make a BIG difference.  15% Solutions show that there is no reason to wait around, feel powerless, or fearful. They help people pick it up a level. They get individuals and the group to focus on what is within their discretion instead of what they cannot change.  With a very simple question, you can flip the conversation to what can be done and find solutions to big problems that are often distributed widely in places not known in advance. Shifting a few grains of sand may trigger a landslide and change the whole landscape.

25. How-Now-Wow Matrix

The problem-solving process is often creative, as complex problems usually require a change of thinking and creative response in order to find the best solutions. While it’s common for the first stages to encourage creative thinking, groups can often gravitate to familiar solutions when it comes to the end of the process. 

When selecting solutions, you don’t want to lose your creative energy! The How-Now-Wow Matrix from Gamestorming is a great problem-solving activity that enables a group to stay creative and think out of the box when it comes to selecting the right solution for a given problem.

Problem-solving techniques that encourage creative thinking and the ideation and selection of new solutions can be the most effective in organisational change. Give the How-Now-Wow Matrix a go, and not just for how pleasant it is to say out loud. 

How-Now-Wow Matrix   #gamestorming   #idea generation   #remote-friendly   When people want to develop new ideas, they most often think out of the box in the brainstorming or divergent phase. However, when it comes to convergence, people often end up picking ideas that are most familiar to them. This is called a ‘creative paradox’ or a ‘creadox’. The How-Now-Wow matrix is an idea selection tool that breaks the creadox by forcing people to weigh each idea on 2 parameters.

26. Impact and Effort Matrix

All problem-solving techniques hope to not only find solutions to a given problem or challenge but to find the best solution. When it comes to finding a solution, groups are invited to put on their decision-making hats and really think about how a proposed idea would work in practice. 

The Impact and Effort Matrix is one of the problem-solving techniques that fall into this camp, empowering participants to first generate ideas and then categorize them into a 2×2 matrix based on impact and effort.

Activities that invite critical thinking while remaining simple are invaluable. Use the Impact and Effort Matrix to move from ideation and towards evaluating potential solutions before then committing to them. 

Impact and Effort Matrix   #gamestorming   #decision making   #action   #remote-friendly   In this decision-making exercise, possible actions are mapped based on two factors: effort required to implement and potential impact. Categorizing ideas along these lines is a useful technique in decision making, as it obliges contributors to balance and evaluate suggested actions before committing to them.

27. Dotmocracy

If you’ve followed each of the problem-solving steps with your group successfully, you should move towards the end of your process with heaps of possible solutions developed with a specific problem in mind. But how do you help a group go from ideation to putting a solution into action? 

Dotmocracy – or Dot Voting -is a tried and tested method of helping a team in the problem-solving process make decisions and put actions in place with a degree of oversight and consensus. 

One of the problem-solving techniques that should be in every facilitator’s toolbox, Dot Voting is fast and effective and can help identify the most popular and best solutions and help bring a group to a decision effectively. 

Dotmocracy   #action   #decision making   #group prioritization   #hyperisland   #remote-friendly   Dotmocracy is a simple method for group prioritization or decision-making. It is not an activity on its own, but a method to use in processes where prioritization or decision-making is the aim. The method supports a group to quickly see which options are most popular or relevant. The options or ideas are written on post-its and stuck up on a wall for the whole group to see. Each person votes for the options they think are the strongest, and that information is used to inform a decision.

All facilitators know that warm-ups and icebreakers are useful for any workshop or group process. Problem-solving workshops are no different.

Use these problem-solving techniques to warm up a group and prepare them for the rest of the process. Activating your group by tapping into some of the top problem-solving skills can be one of the best ways to see great outcomes from your session.

• Check-in/Check-out
• Doodling Together
• Show and Tell
• Constellations
• Draw a Tree

28. Check-in / Check-out

Solid processes are planned from beginning to end, and the best facilitators know that setting the tone and establishing a safe, open environment can be integral to a successful problem-solving process.

Check-in / Check-out is a great way to begin and/or bookend a problem-solving workshop. Checking in to a session emphasizes that everyone will be seen, heard, and expected to contribute. 

If you are running a series of meetings, setting a consistent pattern of checking in and checking out can really help your team get into a groove. We recommend this opening-closing activity for small to medium-sized groups though it can work with large groups if they’re disciplined!

Check-in / Check-out   #team   #opening   #closing   #hyperisland   #remote-friendly   Either checking-in or checking-out is a simple way for a team to open or close a process, symbolically and in a collaborative way. Checking-in/out invites each member in a group to be present, seen and heard, and to express a reflection or a feeling. Checking-in emphasizes presence, focus and group commitment; checking-out emphasizes reflection and symbolic closure.

29. Doodling Together  

Thinking creatively and not being afraid to make suggestions are important problem-solving skills for any group or team, and warming up by encouraging these behaviors is a great way to start. 

Doodling Together is one of our favorite creative ice breaker games – it’s quick, effective, and fun and can make all following problem-solving steps easier by encouraging a group to collaborate visually. By passing cards and adding additional items as they go, the workshop group gets into a groove of co-creation and idea development that is crucial to finding solutions to problems. 

Doodling Together   #collaboration   #creativity   #teamwork   #fun   #team   #visual methods   #energiser   #icebreaker   #remote-friendly   Create wild, weird and often funny postcards together & establish a group’s creative confidence.

30. Show and Tell

You might remember some version of Show and Tell from being a kid in school and it’s a great problem-solving activity to kick off a session.

Asking participants to prepare a little something before a workshop by bringing an object for show and tell can help them warm up before the session has even begun! Games that include a physical object can also help encourage early engagement before moving onto more big-picture thinking.

By asking your participants to tell stories about why they chose to bring a particular item to the group, you can help teams see things from new perspectives and see both differences and similarities in the way they approach a topic. Great groundwork for approaching a problem-solving process as a team! 

Show and Tell   #gamestorming   #action   #opening   #meeting facilitation   Show and Tell taps into the power of metaphors to reveal players’ underlying assumptions and associations around a topic The aim of the game is to get a deeper understanding of stakeholders’ perspectives on anything—a new project, an organizational restructuring, a shift in the company’s vision or team dynamic.

31. Constellations

Who doesn’t love stars? Constellations is a great warm-up activity for any workshop as it gets people up off their feet, energized, and ready to engage in new ways with established topics. It’s also great for showing existing beliefs, biases, and patterns that can come into play as part of your session.

Using warm-up games that help build trust and connection while also allowing for non-verbal responses can be great for easing people into the problem-solving process and encouraging engagement from everyone in the group. Constellations is great in large spaces that allow for movement and is definitely a practical exercise to allow the group to see patterns that are otherwise invisible. 

Constellations   #trust   #connection   #opening   #coaching   #patterns   #system   Individuals express their response to a statement or idea by standing closer or further from a central object. Used with teams to reveal system, hidden patterns, perspectives.

32. Draw a Tree

Problem-solving games that help raise group awareness through a central, unifying metaphor can be effective ways to warm-up a group in any problem-solving model.

Draw a Tree is a simple warm-up activity you can use in any group and which can provide a quick jolt of energy. Start by asking your participants to draw a tree in just 45 seconds – they can choose whether it will be abstract or realistic. 

Once the timer is up, ask the group how many people included the roots of the tree and use this as a means to discuss how we can ignore important parts of any system simply because they are not visible.

All problem-solving strategies are made more effective by thinking of problems critically and by exposing things that may not normally come to light. Warm-up games like Draw a Tree are great in that they quickly demonstrate some key problem-solving skills in an accessible and effective way.

Draw a Tree   #thiagi   #opening   #perspectives   #remote-friendly   With this game you can raise awarness about being more mindful, and aware of the environment we live in.

Each step of the problem-solving workshop benefits from an intelligent deployment of activities, games, and techniques. Bringing your session to an effective close helps ensure that solutions are followed through on and that you also celebrate what has been achieved.

Here are some problem-solving activities you can use to effectively close a workshop or meeting and ensure the great work you’ve done can continue afterward.

• One Breath Feedback
• Who What When Matrix
• Response Cards

How do I conclude a problem-solving process?

All good things must come to an end. With the bulk of the work done, it can be tempting to conclude your workshop swiftly and without a moment to debrief and align. This can be problematic in that it doesn’t allow your team to fully process the results or reflect on the process.

At the end of an effective session, your team will have gone through a process that, while productive, can be exhausting. It’s important to give your group a moment to take a breath, ensure that they are clear on future actions, and provide short feedback before leaving the space. 

The primary purpose of any problem-solving method is to generate solutions and then implement them. Be sure to take the opportunity to ensure everyone is aligned and ready to effectively implement the solutions you produced in the workshop.

Remember that every process can be improved and by giving a short moment to collect feedback in the session, you can further refine your problem-solving methods and see further success in the future too.

33. One Breath Feedback

Maintaining attention and focus during the closing stages of a problem-solving workshop can be tricky and so being concise when giving feedback can be important. It’s easy to incur “death by feedback” should some team members go on for too long sharing their perspectives in a quick feedback round. 

One Breath Feedback is a great closing activity for workshops. You give everyone an opportunity to provide feedback on what they’ve done but only in the space of a single breath. This keeps feedback short and to the point and means that everyone is encouraged to provide the most important piece of feedback to them. 

One breath feedback   #closing   #feedback   #action   This is a feedback round in just one breath that excels in maintaining attention: each participants is able to speak during just one breath … for most people that’s around 20 to 25 seconds … unless of course you’ve been a deep sea diver in which case you’ll be able to do it for longer.

34. Who What When Matrix 

Matrices feature as part of many effective problem-solving strategies and with good reason. They are easily recognizable, simple to use, and generate results.

The Who What When Matrix is a great tool to use when closing your problem-solving session by attributing a who, what and when to the actions and solutions you have decided upon. The resulting matrix is a simple, easy-to-follow way of ensuring your team can move forward. 

Great solutions can’t be enacted without action and ownership. Your problem-solving process should include a stage for allocating tasks to individuals or teams and creating a realistic timeframe for those solutions to be implemented or checked out. Use this method to keep the solution implementation process clear and simple for all involved. 

Who/What/When Matrix   #gamestorming   #action   #project planning   With Who/What/When matrix, you can connect people with clear actions they have defined and have committed to.

35. Response cards

Group discussion can comprise the bulk of most problem-solving activities and by the end of the process, you might find that your team is talked out! 

Providing a means for your team to give feedback with short written notes can ensure everyone is head and can contribute without the need to stand up and talk. Depending on the needs of the group, giving an alternative can help ensure everyone can contribute to your problem-solving model in the way that makes the most sense for them.

Response Cards is a great way to close a workshop if you are looking for a gentle warm-down and want to get some swift discussion around some of the feedback that is raised. 

Response Cards   #debriefing   #closing   #structured sharing   #questions and answers   #thiagi   #action   It can be hard to involve everyone during a closing of a session. Some might stay in the background or get unheard because of louder participants. However, with the use of Response Cards, everyone will be involved in providing feedback or clarify questions at the end of a session.

Save time and effort discovering the right solutions

A structured problem solving process is a surefire way of solving tough problems, discovering creative solutions and driving organizational change. But how can you design for successful outcomes?

With SessionLab, it’s easy to design engaging workshops that deliver results. Drag, drop and reorder blocks  to build your agenda. When you make changes or update your agenda, your session  timing   adjusts automatically , saving you time on manual adjustments.

Collaborating with stakeholders or clients? Share your agenda with a single click and collaborate in real-time. No more sending documents back and forth over email.

Explore  how to use SessionLab  to design effective problem solving workshops or  watch this five minute video  to see the planner in action!

Over to you

The problem-solving process can often be as complicated and multifaceted as the problems they are set-up to solve. With the right problem-solving techniques and a mix of creative exercises designed to guide discussion and generate purposeful ideas, we hope we’ve given you the tools to find the best solutions as simply and easily as possible.

Is there a problem-solving technique that you are missing here? Do you have a favorite activity or method you use when facilitating? Let us know in the comments below, we’d love to hear from you! 

thank you very much for these excellent techniques

Certainly wonderful article, very detailed. Shared!

Your list of techniques for problem solving can be helpfully extended by adding TRIZ to the list of techniques. TRIZ has 40 problem solving techniques derived from methods inventros and patent holders used to get new patents. About 10-12 are general approaches. many organization sponsor classes in TRIZ that are used to solve business problems or general organiztational problems. You can take a look at TRIZ and dwonload a free internet booklet to see if you feel it shound be included per your selection process.

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How to Be a More Creative Problem-Solver at Work: 8 Tips

• 01 Mar 2022

The importance of creativity in the workplace—particularly when problem-solving—is undeniable. Business leaders can’t approach new problems with old solutions and expect the same result.

This is where innovation-based processes need to guide problem-solving. Here’s an overview of what creative problem-solving is, along with tips on how to use it in conjunction with design thinking.

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What Is Creative Problem-Solving?

Encountering problems with no clear cause can be frustrating. This occurs when there’s disagreement around a defined problem or research yields unclear results. In such situations, creative problem-solving helps develop solutions, despite a lack of clarity.

While creative problem-solving is less structured than other forms of innovation, it encourages exploring open-ended ideas and shifting perspectives—thereby fostering innovation and easier adaptation in the workplace. It also works best when paired with other innovation-based processes, such as design thinking .

Creative Problem-Solving and Design Thinking

Design thinking is a solutions-based mentality that encourages innovation and problem-solving. It’s guided by an iterative process that Harvard Business School Dean Srikant Datar outlines in four stages in the online course Design Thinking and Innovation :

• Clarify: This stage involves researching a problem through empathic observation and insights.
• Ideate: This stage focuses on generating ideas and asking open-ended questions based on observations made during the clarification stage.
• Develop: The development stage involves exploring possible solutions based on the ideas you generate. Experimentation and prototyping are both encouraged.
• Implement: The final stage is a culmination of the previous three. It involves finalizing a solution’s development and communicating its value to stakeholders.

Although user research is an essential first step in the design thinking process, there are times when it can’t identify a problem’s root cause. Creative problem-solving addresses this challenge by promoting the development of new perspectives.

Leveraging tools like design thinking and creativity at work can further your problem-solving abilities. Here are eight tips for doing so.

8 Creative Problem-Solving Tips

1. empathize with your audience.

A fundamental practice of design thinking’s clarify stage is empathy. Understanding your target audience can help you find creative and relevant solutions for their pain points through observing them and asking questions.

Practice empathy by paying attention to others’ needs and avoiding personal comparisons. The more you understand your audience, the more effective your solutions will be.

2. Reframe Problems as Questions

If a problem is difficult to define, reframe it as a question rather than a statement. For example, instead of saying, "The problem is," try framing around a question like, "How might we?" Think creatively by shifting your focus from the problem to potential solutions.

Consider this hypothetical case study: You’re the owner of a local coffee shop trying to fill your tip jar. Approaching the situation with a problem-focused mindset frames this as: "We need to find a way to get customers to tip more." If you reframe this as a question, however, you can explore: "How might we make it easier for customers to tip?" When you shift your focus from the shop to the customer, you empathize with your audience. You can take this train of thought one step further and consider questions such as: "How might we provide a tipping method for customers who don't carry cash?"

Whether you work at a coffee shop, a startup, or a Fortune 500 company, reframing can help surface creative solutions to problems that are difficult to define.

3. Defer Judgment of Ideas

If you encounter an idea that seems outlandish or unreasonable, a natural response would be to reject it. This instant judgment impedes creativity. Even if ideas seem implausible, they can play a huge part in ideation. It's important to permit the exploration of original ideas.

While judgment can be perceived as negative, it’s crucial to avoid accepting ideas too quickly. If you love an idea, don’t immediately pursue it. Give equal consideration to each proposal and build on different concepts instead of acting on them immediately.

4. Overcome Cognitive Fixedness

Cognitive fixedness is a state of mind that prevents you from recognizing a situation’s alternative solutions or interpretations instead of considering every situation through the lens of past experiences.

Although it's efficient in the short-term, cognitive fixedness interferes with creative thinking because it prevents you from approaching situations unbiased. It's important to be aware of this tendency so you can avoid it.

5. Balance Divergent and Convergent Thinking

One of the key principles of creative problem-solving is the balance of divergent and convergent thinking. Divergent thinking is the process of brainstorming multiple ideas without limitation; open-ended creativity is encouraged. It’s an effective tool for generating ideas, but not every idea can be explored. Divergent thinking eventually needs to be grounded in reality.

Convergent thinking, on the other hand, is the process of narrowing ideas down into a few options. While converging ideas too quickly stifles creativity, it’s an important step that bridges the gap between ideation and development. It's important to strike a healthy balance between both to allow for the ideation and exploration of creative ideas.

6. Use Creative Tools

Using creative tools is another way to foster innovation. Without a clear cause for a problem, such tools can help you avoid cognitive fixedness and abrupt decision-making. Here are several examples:

Problem Stories

Creating a problem story requires identifying undesired phenomena (UDP) and taking note of events that precede and result from them. The goal is to reframe the situations to visualize their cause and effect.

To start, identify a UDP. Then, discover what events led to it. Observe and ask questions of your consumer base to determine the UDP’s cause.

Next, identify why the UDP is a problem. What effect does the UDP have that necessitates changing the status quo? It's helpful to visualize each event in boxes adjacent to one another when answering such questions.

The problem story can be extended in either direction, as long as there are additional cause-and-effect relationships. Once complete, focus on breaking the chains connecting two subsequent events by disrupting the cause-and-effect relationship between them.

Alternate Worlds

The alternate worlds tool encourages you to consider how people from different backgrounds would approach similar situations. For instance, how would someone in hospitality versus manufacturing approach the same problem? This tool isn't intended to instantly solve problems but, rather, to encourage idea generation and creativity.

7. Use Positive Language

It's vital to maintain a positive mindset when problem-solving and avoid negative words that interfere with creativity. Positive language prevents quick judgments and overcomes cognitive fixedness. Instead of "no, but," use words like "yes, and."

Positive language makes others feel heard and valued rather than shut down. This practice doesn’t necessitate agreeing with every idea but instead approaching each from a positive perspective.

Using “yes, and” as a tool for further idea exploration is also effective. If someone presents an idea, build upon it using “yes, and.” What additional features could improve it? How could it benefit consumers beyond its intended purpose?

While it may not seem essential, this small adjustment can make a big difference in encouraging creativity.

8. Practice Design Thinking

Practicing design thinking can make you a more creative problem-solver. While commonly associated with the workplace, adopting a design thinking mentality can also improve your everyday life. Here are several ways you can practice design thinking:

• Learn from others: There are many examples of design thinking in business . Review case studies to learn from others’ successes, research problems companies haven't addressed, and consider alternative solutions using the design thinking process.
• Approach everyday problems with a design thinking mentality: One of the best ways to practice design thinking is to apply it to your daily life. Approach everyday problems using design thinking’s four-stage framework to uncover what solutions it yields.
• Study design thinking: While learning design thinking independently is a great place to start, taking an online course can offer more insight and practical experience. The right course can teach you important skills , increase your marketability, and provide valuable networking opportunities.

Ready to Become a Creative Problem-Solver?

Though creativity comes naturally to some, it's an acquired skill for many. Regardless of which category you're in, improving your ability to innovate is a valuable endeavor. Whether you want to bolster your creativity or expand your professional skill set, taking an innovation-based course can enhance your problem-solving.

If you're ready to become a more creative problem-solver, explore Design Thinking and Innovation , one of our online entrepreneurship and innovation courses . If you aren't sure which course is the right fit, download our free course flowchart to determine which best aligns with your goals.

About the Author

How to Develop a Problem Solving Mindset?

What was the last problem you faced at work?

• An employee issue?
• A difficult client?
• Non-payment?
• Vendor mismanagement? 

Problems are inevitable. The question is — how do you solve these problems?

As defined by MIT , “problem-solving is the process of identifying a problem, developing possible solution paths, and taking the appropriate course of action.”

Problem-solving mindset is an important skill set for any professional especially if you are an entrepreneur, manager, or someone in the leadership team in an organization. 

Be it in life or at the workplace , a problem-solving mindset helps to keep the surrounding under control while exploring new opportunities. Here are some tips to help you develop a problem-solving mindset. 

6 steps to develop a problem-solving mindset

No business is immune to problems . If you are in a management role, you will be focusing a lot of your time in identifying and solving problems. 

Having a problem-solving mindset is the skill that will help you in the long run. Here’s how you can develop a problem-solving mindset. 

1.    Embrace the problem

The word “problem” has a negative impact on our minds. 

When someone says “ there is a problem ” the brain starts focusing more on the problem and suppresses the mind to come up with a solution . When you embrace a problem and acknowledge it as a part and parcel of life and work, you will have a more open outlook towards it. This will help you focus more on the solution instead of just brooding over the problem. 

Here is a quick tip: Every morning get up from sleep expecting to encounter problems at work. When your mind is prepared to encounter a problem, you will do better at solving it. 

2. Focus on the solution

You can spend time obsessing over what’s gone wrong or you can shift your focus on coming up with solutions. The choice is yours. 

Instead of focussing on the problem, adopt a solution-focused approach . The key principle of this approach is are based on two simple ideas: 

Here is a classic example of how Honda did away with what didn’t work for them and focused on what worked for them when they forayed into the US motorcycle market.

As quoted in HBR , “In 1958, the American motorcycle market was dominated by robust players like Harley Davidson and Honda’s bike was not able to compete with it. 

At the same time, it was found by Honda that its smaller motorcycles that were mainly used by its employees to run errands in town were gaining popularity among young buyers who wanted affordable, convenient, and independent transportation. 

Soon, Honda realized this and changed its strategy. Instead of its giant bikes, it started focusing on selling its small bikes. Thus, Honda from no presence in the US market made 63% of the market in 1959.”

3. Come up with all possible solutions

Start with listing down all the solutions that you can think of. If needed, brainstorm with your team to come up with all the possible solutions.

Let’s say, a recent employee survey revealed that your employees are dissatisfied with the leadership communication. Now, that’s a problem.

What can be the possible solutions?

When you make a list of all possible solutions, you’re in a better place to evaluate options and measure effectiveness. 

It’s a good idea to use mind mapping tools to visualize all the possible solutions, weigh their pros and cons, and make a more informed decision. 

4. Analyze the root cause

To nurture a positive mindset you need to focus more on the solution. To do so, analyze the root cause of the problem. 

Sakichi Toyoda’s 5 Why Technique initially used at Toyota is a fantastic tool to analyze the root cause. The philosophy of this technique is simple. Whenever there is a problem, ask the question ‘Why’ five times. This helps to devise a countermeasure for the problem. You then follow through it until the problem is solved and stop recurring. 

This technique works well when the problem is simple to moderate. For more critical problems, different techniques like cause and effect analysis or failure mode and effects analysis might be more suitable. 

5. Take on a new perspective

See your problems as opportunities to grow. 

If you are too bothered with a nagging issue, take a step back and try to look at it with a new perspective . Brainstorming sessions with others also help you to see things with a new perspective which you might have missed out on otherwise. 

When you see a problem with a fresh perspective, you see it as an opportunity to grow and come up with a new solution. 

6. Implement solutions and monitor them

Once you identify the problem and come up with all the possible solutions, put down all your information in one place. The more information you have, the chances for a positive outcome is better. Now, go through all the options, choose the best-suited one for the situation and set measurable goals. 

Finally, it is time to implement the solution. So, if the problem was exceeding budgets for overheads, measure and monitor if the new solution has been able to reduce it? If not, you need to relook at your solution and come up with an alternative solution. 

A problem-solving mindset is an asset to any organization. It is more than just a skill. 

A person with a problem-solving mindset sees a problem as an opportunity to grow and is motivated to find solutions, thereby focussing on growth and achieving positive results.  ___________________________________________________________________________

Adela Belin is a content marketer and blogger at Writers Per Hour . She is passionate about sharing stories with the hope to make a difference in people’s lives and contribute to their personal and professional growth. Find her on Twitter and LinkedIn .  

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Self-Assessment • 20 min read

How Good Is Your Problem Solving?

Use a systematic approach..

By the Mind Tools Content Team

Good problem solving skills are fundamentally important if you're going to be successful in your career.

But problems are something that we don't particularly like.

They're time-consuming.

They muscle their way into already packed schedules.

They force us to think about an uncertain future.

And they never seem to go away!

That's why, when faced with problems, most of us try to eliminate them as quickly as possible. But have you ever chosen the easiest or most obvious solution – and then realized that you have entirely missed a much better solution? Or have you found yourself fixing just the symptoms of a problem, only for the situation to get much worse?

To be an effective problem-solver, you need to be systematic and logical in your approach. This quiz helps you assess your current approach to problem solving. By improving this, you'll make better overall decisions. And as you increase your confidence with solving problems, you'll be less likely to rush to the first solution – which may not necessarily be the best one.

Once you've completed the quiz, we'll direct you to tools and resources that can help you make the most of your problem-solving skills.

How Good Are You at Solving Problems?

Instructions.

For each statement, click the button in the column that best describes you. Please answer questions as you actually are (rather than how you think you should be), and don't worry if some questions seem to score in the 'wrong direction'. When you are finished, please click the 'Calculate My Total' button at the bottom of the test.

Answering these questions should have helped you recognize the key steps associated with effective problem solving.

This quiz is based on Dr Min Basadur's Simplexity Thinking problem-solving model. This eight-step process follows the circular pattern shown below, within which current problems are solved and new problems are identified on an ongoing basis. This assessment has not been validated and is intended for illustrative purposes only.

Below, we outline the tools and strategies you can use for each stage of the problem-solving process. Enjoy exploring these stages!

Step 1: Find the Problem (Questions 7, 12)

Some problems are very obvious, however others are not so easily identified. As part of an effective problem-solving process, you need to look actively for problems – even when things seem to be running fine. Proactive problem solving helps you avoid emergencies and allows you to be calm and in control when issues arise.

These techniques can help you do this:

PEST Analysis helps you pick up changes to your environment that you should be paying attention to. Make sure too that you're watching changes in customer needs and market dynamics, and that you're monitoring trends that are relevant to your industry.

Risk Analysis helps you identify significant business risks.

Failure Modes and Effects Analysis helps you identify possible points of failure in your business process, so that you can fix these before problems arise.

After Action Reviews help you scan recent performance to identify things that can be done better in the future.

Where you have several problems to solve, our articles on Prioritization and Pareto Analysis help you think about which ones you should focus on first.

Step 2: Find the Facts (Questions 10, 14)

After identifying a potential problem, you need information. What factors contribute to the problem? Who is involved with it? What solutions have been tried before? What do others think about the problem?

If you move forward to find a solution too quickly, you risk relying on imperfect information that's based on assumptions and limited perspectives, so make sure that you research the problem thoroughly.

Step 3: Define the Problem (Questions 3, 9)

Now that you understand the problem, define it clearly and completely. Writing a clear problem definition forces you to establish specific boundaries for the problem. This keeps the scope from growing too large, and it helps you stay focused on the main issues.

A great tool to use at this stage is CATWOE . With this process, you analyze potential problems by looking at them from six perspectives, those of its Customers; Actors (people within the organization); the Transformation, or business process; the World-view, or top-down view of what's going on; the Owner; and the wider organizational Environment. By looking at a situation from these perspectives, you can open your mind and come to a much sharper and more comprehensive definition of the problem.

Cause and Effect Analysis is another good tool to use here, as it helps you think about the many different factors that can contribute to a problem. This helps you separate the symptoms of a problem from its fundamental causes.

Step 4: Find Ideas (Questions 4, 13)

With a clear problem definition, start generating ideas for a solution. The key here is to be flexible in the way you approach a problem. You want to be able to see it from as many perspectives as possible. Looking for patterns or common elements in different parts of the problem can sometimes help. You can also use metaphors and analogies to help analyze the problem, discover similarities to other issues, and think of solutions based on those similarities.

Traditional brainstorming and reverse brainstorming are very useful here. By taking the time to generate a range of creative solutions to the problem, you'll significantly increase the likelihood that you'll find the best possible solution, not just a semi-adequate one. Where appropriate, involve people with different viewpoints to expand the volume of ideas generated.

Tip: Don't evaluate your ideas until step 5. If you do, this will limit your creativity at too early a stage.

Step 5: Select and Evaluate (Questions 6, 15)

After finding ideas, you'll have many options that must be evaluated. It's tempting at this stage to charge in and start discarding ideas immediately. However, if you do this without first determining the criteria for a good solution, you risk rejecting an alternative that has real potential.

Decide what elements are needed for a realistic and practical solution, and think about the criteria you'll use to choose between potential solutions.

Paired Comparison Analysis , Decision Matrix Analysis and Risk Analysis are useful techniques here, as are many of the specialist resources available within our Decision-Making section . Enjoy exploring these!

Step 6: Plan (Questions 1, 16)

You might think that choosing a solution is the end of a problem-solving process. In fact, it's simply the start of the next phase in problem solving: implementation. This involves lots of planning and preparation. If you haven't already developed a full Risk Analysis in the evaluation phase, do so now. It's important to know what to be prepared for as you begin to roll out your proposed solution.

The type of planning that you need to do depends on the size of the implementation project that you need to set up. For small projects, all you'll often need are Action Plans that outline who will do what, when, and how. Larger projects need more sophisticated approaches – you'll find out more about these in the article What is Project Management? And for projects that affect many other people, you'll need to think about Change Management as well.

Here, it can be useful to conduct an Impact Analysis to help you identify potential resistance as well as alert you to problems you may not have anticipated. Force Field Analysis will also help you uncover the various pressures for and against your proposed solution. Once you've done the detailed planning, it can also be useful at this stage to make a final Go/No-Go Decision , making sure that it's actually worth going ahead with the selected option.

Step 7: Sell the Idea (Questions 5, 8)

As part of the planning process, you must convince other stakeholders that your solution is the best one. You'll likely meet with resistance, so before you try to “sell” your idea, make sure you've considered all the consequences.

As you begin communicating your plan, listen to what people say, and make changes as necessary. The better the overall solution meets everyone's needs, the greater its positive impact will be! For more tips on selling your idea, read our article on Creating a Value Proposition and use our Sell Your Idea Skillbook.

Step 8: Act (Questions 2, 11)

Finally, once you've convinced your key stakeholders that your proposed solution is worth running with, you can move on to the implementation stage. This is the exciting and rewarding part of problem solving, which makes the whole process seem worthwhile.

This action stage is an end, but it's also a beginning: once you've completed your implementation, it's time to move into the next cycle of problem solving by returning to the scanning stage. By doing this, you'll continue improving your organization as you move into the future.

Problem solving is an exceptionally important workplace skill.

Being a competent and confident problem solver will create many opportunities for you. By using a well-developed model like Simplexity Thinking for solving problems, you can approach the process systematically, and be comfortable that the decisions you make are solid.

Given the unpredictable nature of problems, it's very reassuring to know that, by following a structured plan, you've done everything you can to resolve the problem to the best of your ability.

This assessment has not been validated and is intended for illustrative purposes only. It is just one of many Mind Tool quizzes that can help you to evaluate your abilities in a wide range of important career skills.

If you want to reproduce this quiz, you can purchase downloadable copies in our Store .

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Solve It!: The Mindset and Tools of Smart Problem Solvers Paperback – November 15, 2021

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• Gain insights into the surprising findings of the science of problem solving
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"I found Solve It! to be a practically useful, thought provoking and uplifting read which will be invaluable to experienced problem solvers and beginners alike. I love the way it combines techniques for getting the mind 'match fit' for tackling problems alongside practical and logical tools for solving perennial problems we all face once and for all!"

-- Jonathan Borrett , Head of Profession for Problem Solving, Devon and Cornwall Police, Exeter, UK

"While many experts often focus on just the problem solving process, Dr. Sternad's important book does a great job of emphasizing the

critical mindset needed to successfully engage in this process."

-- Edward C. Chang, Ph.D. , Professor of Psychology and Social Work, University of Michigan

"Solve It! is a highly accessible guide to problem‐solving-whether at work or in life-that seamlessly integrates scientifically‐rooted principles with practical guidelines and real‐world vignettes making this well‐rounded book accessible to and relevant for a variety of audiences, ranging from student to professional.

-- Jessica Mesmer‐Magnus, Ph.D. , SHRM‐SCP, Professor & Chair, Department of Management, Cameron School of Business, University of North Carolina Wilmington

"A great piece of work, which was much needed for spreading one of the most important skills in management!"

-- Roberto Quaglia, Ph.D. , former consultant at McKinsey & Company and Professor of Strategy and Management, ESCP Business School, Paris

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Dr Dietmar Sternad is a passionate management educator. He aims to create highly engaging learning experiences and learning materials that help his students and other people to become better leaders who can make a difference in the world.

Dietmar is a Professor of International Management at CUAS/FH Kärnten (Austria) and has extensive experience as a CEO of publishing companies as well as in teaching, consulting, and coaching top managers. He holds degrees from universities in Austria, Slovenia, and the UK, is an alumnus of the GLOCOLL (Harvard Business School) and IMTA (CEEMAN) management teachers programs and has received several national and international awards (e.g. from the Academy of Management or the Austrian State Prize for Teaching Excellence).

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Six problem-solving mindsets for very uncertain times

Great problem solvers are made, not born. That’s what we’ve found after decades of problem solving with leaders across business, nonprofit, and policy sectors. These leaders learn to adopt a particularly open and curious mindset, and adhere to a systematic process for cracking even the most inscrutable problems. They’re terrific problem solvers under any conditions. And when conditions of uncertainty are at their peak, they’re at their brilliant best.

Six mutually reinforcing approaches underly their success: (1) being ever-curious about every element of a problem; (2) being imperfectionists , with a high tolerance for ambiguity; (3) having a “dragonfly eye” view of the world, to see through multiple lenses; (4) pursuing occurrent behavior and experimenting relentlessly; (5) tapping into the collective intelligence , acknowledging that the smartest people are not in the room; and (6) practicing “show and tell” because storytelling begets action (exhibit).

Here’s how they do it.

1. Be ever-curious

As any parent knows, four-year-olds are unceasing askers. Think of the never-ending “whys” that make little children so delightful—and relentless. For the very young, everything is new and wildly uncertain. But they’re on a mission of discovery, and they’re determined to figure things out. And they’re good at it! That high-energy inquisitiveness is why we have high shelves and childproof bottles.

When you face radical uncertainty, remember your four-year-old or channel the four-year-old within you. Relentlessly ask, “Why is this so?” Unfortunately, somewhere between preschool and the boardroom, we tend to stop asking. Our brains make sense of massive numbers of data points by imposing patterns that have worked for us and other humans in the past. That’s why a simple technique, worth employing at the beginning of problem solving, is simply to pause and ask why conditions or assumptions are so until you arrive at the root of the problem. 1 This approach was originally developed by Sakichi Toyoda, the founder of Toyota.

Natural human biases in decision making, including confirmation, availability, and anchoring biases, often cause us to shut down the range of solutions too early. 2 Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow , New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011. Better—and more creative—solutions come from being curious about the broader range of potential answers.

One simple suggestion from author and economist Caroline Webb to generate more curiosity in team problem solving is to put a question mark behind your initial hypotheses or first-cut answers. This small artifice is surprisingly powerful: it tends to encourage multiple solution paths and puts the focus, correctly, on assembling evidence. We also like thesis/antithesis, or red team/blue team, sessions, in which you divide a group into opposing teams that argue against the early answers—typically, more traditional conclusions that are more likely to come from a conventional pattern. Why is this solution better? Why not that one? We’ve found that better results come from embracing uncertainty. Curiosity is the engine of creativity.

We have to be comfortable with estimating probabilities to make good decisions, even when these guesses are imperfect. Unfortunately, we have truckloads of evidence showing that human beings aren’t good intuitive statisticians.

2. Tolerate ambiguity—and stay humble!

When we think of problem solvers, many of us tend to picture a poised and brilliant engineer. We may imagine a mastermind who knows what she’s doing and approaches a problem with purpose. The reality, though, is that most good problem solving has a lot of trial and error; it’s more like the apparent randomness of rugby than the precision of linear programming. We form hypotheses, porpoise into the data, and then surface and refine (or throw out) our initial guess at the answer. This above all requires an embrace of imperfection and a tolerance for ambiguity—and a gambler’s sense of probabilities.

The real world is highly uncertain. Reality unfolds as the complex product of stochastic events and human reactions. The impact of COVID-19 is but one example: we address the health and economic effects of the disease, and their complex interactions, with almost no prior knowledge. We have to be comfortable with estimating probabilities to make good decisions, even when these guesses are imperfect. Unfortunately, we have truckloads of evidence showing that human beings aren’t good intuitive statisticians. Guesses based on gut instinct can be wildly wrong. That’s why one of the keys to operating in uncertain environments is epistemic humility, which Erik Angner defines as “the realization that our knowledge is always provisional and incomplete—and that it might require revision in light of new evidence.” 3 Erik Angner, “Epistemic humility—knowing your limits in a pandemic,” Behavioral Scientist , April 13, 2020, behavioralscientist.org.

Recent research shows that we are better at solving problems when we think in terms of odds rather than certainties. 4 Annie Duke, Thinking in Terms of Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts , New York, NY: Portfolio/Penguin, 2018. For example, when the Australian research body Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), which owned a core patent on the wireless internet protocol, sought royalties from major companies, it was initially rebuffed. The CSIRO bet that it could go to court to protect its intellectual property because it estimated that it needed only 10 percent odds of success for this to be a good wager, given the legal costs and likely payoff. It improved its odds by picking the weakest of the IP violators and selecting a legal jurisdiction that favored plaintiffs. This probabilistic thinking paid off and eventually led to settlements to CSIRO exceeding $500 million. 5 CSIRO briefing to US Government, December 5, 2006. A tolerance for ambiguity and a willingness to play the odds helped the organization feel its way to a good solution path.

To embrace imperfectionism with epistemic humility, start by challenging solutions that imply certainty. You can do that in the nicest way by asking questions such as “What would we have to believe for this to be true?” This brings to the surface implicit assumptions about probabilities and makes it easier to assess alternatives. When uncertainty is high, see if you can make small moves or acquire information at a reasonable cost to edge out into a solution set. Perfect knowledge is in short supply, particularly for complex business and societal problems. Embracing imperfection can lead to more effective problem solving. It’s practically a must in situations of high uncertainty, such as the beginning of a problem-solving process or during an emergency.

Good problem solving typically involves designing experiments to reduce key uncertainties. Each move provides additional information and builds capabilities.

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3. take a dragonfly-eye view.

Dragonfly-eye perception is common to great problem solvers. Dragonflies have large, compound eyes, with thousands of lenses and photoreceptors sensitive to different wavelengths of light. Although we don’t know exactly how their insect brains process all this visual information, by analogy they see multiple perspectives not available to humans. The idea of a dragonfly eye taking in 360 degrees of perception 6 Philip Tetlock and Dan Gardner, Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction , New York, NY: Crown, 2015. is an attribute of “superforecasters”—people, often without domain expertise, who are the best at forecasting events.

Think of this as widening the aperture on a problem or viewing it through multiple lenses. The object is to see beyond the familiar tropes into which our pattern-recognizing brains want to assemble perceptions. By widening the aperture, we can identify threats or opportunities beyond the periphery of vision.

Consider the outbreak of HIV in India in the early 1990s—a major public-health threat. Ashok Alexander, director of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s India Aids Initiative, provided a brilliant example of not just vision but also dragonfly vision. Facing a complex social map with a rapidly increasing infection rate, he widened the problem’s definition, from a traditional epidemiological HIV transmission model at known “hot spots,” to one in which sex workers facing violence were made the centerpiece.

This approach led to the “Avahan solution,” which addressed a broader set of leverage points by including the sociocultural context of sex work. The solution was rolled out to more than 600 communities and eventually credited with preventing 600,000 infections. The narrow medical perspective was sensible and expected, but it didn’t tap into the related issue of violence against sex workers, which yielded a richer solution set. Often, a secret unlocks itself only when one looks at a problem from multiple perspectives, including some that initially seem orthogonal.

The secret to developing a dragonfly-eye view is to “anchor outside” rather than inside when faced with problems of uncertainty and opportunity. Take the broader ecosystem as a starting point. That will encourage you to talk with customers, suppliers, or, better yet, players in a different but related industry or space. Going through the customer journey with design-thinking in mind is another powerful way to get a 360-degree view of a problem. But take note: when decision makers face highly constrained time frames or resources, they may have to narrow the aperture and deliver a tight, conventional answer.

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4. pursue occurrent behavior.

Occurrent behavior is what actually happens in a time and place, not what was potential or predicted behavior. Complex problems don’t give up their secrets easily. But that shouldn’t deter problem solvers from exploring whether evidence on the facets of a solution can be observed, or running experiments to test hypotheses. You can think of this approach as creating data rather than just looking for what has been collected already. It’s critical for new market entry—or new market creation. It also comes in handy should you find that crunching old data is leading to stale solutions.

Most of the problem-solving teams we are involved with have twin dilemmas of uncertainty and complexity, at times combined as truly “wicked problems.” 7 A term coined in a now famous 1973 article: Horst W. J. Rittel and Melvin Webber, “Dilemmas in a general theory of planning,” Policy Sciences , 1973, Number 4, pp. 155–69. For companies ambitious to win in the great unknown in an emerging segment—such as electric cars or autonomous vehicles, where the market isn’t fully established—good problem solving typically involves designing experiments to reduce key uncertainties, not just relying on existing data. Each move (such as buying IP or acquiring a component supplier) and each experiment (including on-road closed tests) not only provides additional information to make decisions but also builds capabilities and assets that support further steps. Over time, their experiments, including alliances and acquisitions, come to resemble staircases that lead to either the goal or to abandonment of the goal. Problem-solving organizations can “bootstrap” themselves into highly uncertain new spaces, building information, foundational assets, and confidence as they take steps forward.

Risk-embracing problem solvers find a solution path by constantly experimenting. Statisticians use the abbreviation EVPI—the expected value of perfect information—to show the value of gaining additional information that typically comes from samples and experiments, such as responses to price changes in particular markets. A/B testing is a powerful tool for experimenting with prices, promotions, and other features and is particularly useful for digital marketplaces and consumer goods. Online marketplaces make A/B testing easy. Yet most conventional markets also offer opportunities to mimic the market’s segmentation and use it to test different approaches.

The mindset required to be a restless experimenter is consistent with the notion in start-ups of “failing fast.” It means that you get product and customer affirmation or rejection quickly through beta tests and trial offerings. Don’t take a lack of external data as an impediment—it may actually be a gift, since purchasable data is almost always from a conventional way of meeting needs, and is available to your competitors too. Your own experiments allow you to generate your own data; this gives you insights that others don’t have. If it is difficult (or unethical) to experiment, look for the “natural experiments” provided by different policies in similar locations. An example would be to compare outcomes in twin cities, such as Minneapolis–St. Paul.

It’s a mistake to think that your team has the smartest people in the room. They aren’t there. They’re invariably somewhere else. Nor do they need to be there if you can access their intelligence via other means.

5. Tap into collective intelligence and the wisdom of the crowd

Chris Bradley, a coauthor of Strategy Beyond the Hockey Stick , 8 Chris Bradley, Marin Hirt, and Sven Smit, Strategy Beyond the Hockey Stick: People, Probabilities, and Big Moves to Beat the Odds , Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2018. observed that “it’s a mistake to think that on your team you have the smartest people in the room. They aren’t there. They’re invariably somewhere else.” 9 For more from Chris Bradley, in a conversation with Rob McLean, see “ Want better strategies? Become a bulletproof problem solver ,” August 2019. Nor do they need to be there if you can access their intelligence via other means. In an ever-changing world where conditions can evolve unpredictably, crowdsourcing invites the smartest people in the world to work with you. For example, in seeking a machine-learning algorithm to identify fish catch species and quantities on fishing boats, the Nature Conservancy (TNC) turned to Kaggle and offered a $150,000 prize for the best algorithm. This offer attracted 2,293 teams from all over the world. TNC now uses the winning algorithm to identify fish types and sizes caught on fishing boats in Asia to protect endangered Pacific tuna and other species.

Crowdsourced problem solving is familiar in another guise: benchmarking. When Sir Rod Carnegie was CEO of Conzinc Riotinto Australia (CRA), he was concerned about the costs of unscheduled downtime with heavy trucks, particularly those requiring tire changes. He asked his management team who was best in the world at changing tires; their answer was Formula One, the auto racing competition. A team traveled to the United Kingdom to learn best practice for tire changes in racetrack pits and then implemented what it learned thousands of miles away, in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. The smartest team for this problem wasn’t in the mining industry at all.

Of course, while crowdsourcing can be useful when conventional thinking yields solutions that are too expensive or incomplete for the challenge at hand, it has its limitations. Good crowdsourcing takes time to set up, can be expensive, and may signal to your competitors what you are up to. Beware of hidden costs, such as inadvertently divulging information and having to sieve through huge volumes of irrelevant, inferior suggestions to find the rare gem of a solution.

Accept that it’s OK to draw on diverse experiences and expertise other than your own. Start with brainstorming sessions that engage people from outside your team. Try broader crowdsourcing competitions to generate ideas. Or bring in deep-learning talent to see what insights exist in your data that conventional approaches haven’t brought to light. The broader the circles of information you access, the more likely it is that your solutions will be novel and creative.

Rookie problem solvers show you their analytic process and math to convince you they are clever. Seasoned problem solvers show you differently.

6. Show and tell to drive action

We started our list of mindsets with a reference to children, and we return to children now, with “show and tell.” As you no doubt remember—back when you were more curious!—show and tell is an elementary-school activity. It’s not usually associated with problem solving, but it probably piqued your interest. In fact, this approach is critical to problem solving. Show and tell is how you connect your audience with the problem and then use combinations of logic and persuasion to get action.

The show-and-tell mindset aims to bring decision makers into a problem-solving domain you have created. A team from the Nature Conservancy, for instance, was presenting a proposal asking a philanthropic foundation to support the restoration of oyster reefs. Before the presentation, the team brought 17 plastic buckets of water into the boardroom and placed them around the perimeter. When the foundation’s staff members entered the room, they immediately wanted to know what the buckets were for. The team explained that oyster-reef restoration massively improves water quality because each oyster filters 17 buckets of water per day. Fish stocks improve, and oysters can also be harvested to help make the economics work. The decision makers were brought into the problem-solving domain through show and tell. They approved the funding requested and loved the physical dimension of the problem they were part of solving.

Rookie problem solvers show you their analytic process and mathematics to convince you that they are clever. That’s sometimes called APK, the anxious parade of knowledge. But seasoned problem solvers show you differently. The most elegant problem solving is that which makes the solution obvious. The late economist Herb Simon put it this way: “Solving a problem simply means representing it so as to make the solution transparent.” 10 Herbert Simon, The Sciences of the Artificial , Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1969.

To get better at show and tell, start by being clear about the action that should flow from your problem solving and findings: the governing idea for change. Then find a way to present your logic visually so that the path to answers can be debated and embraced. Present the argument emotionally as well as logically, and show why the preferred action offers an attractive balance between risks and rewards. But don’t stop there. Spell out the risks of inaction, which often have a higher cost than imperfect actions have.

The mindsets of great problem solvers are just as important as the methods they employ. A mindset that encourages curiosity, embraces imperfection, rewards a dragonfly-eye view of the problem, creates new data from experiments and collective intelligence, and drives action through compelling show-and-tell storytelling creates radical new possibilities under high levels of unpredictability. Of course, these approaches can be helpful in a broad range of circumstances, but in times of massive uncertainty, they are essential.

Charles Conn is an alumnus of McKinsey’s Sydney office and is a board member of Patagonia and former CEO of the Rhodes Trust. Robert McLean is an alumnus of the Sydney office and is the advisory-board chair of the Nature Conservancy Australia. They are the authors of Bulletproof Problem Solving: The One Skill That Changes Everything (Wiley, 2018).

This article was edited by David Schwartz, an executive editor in the Tel Aviv office.

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Optimization beyond data: Design thinking for SEO

One of the things I love about SEO is its inherent duality.

We get to leverage both sides of our brains:

• The right brain when it comes to on-page, content and even link building campaigns.
• The left brain when it comes to technical, data analysis, etc.

However, it’s easy to think of SEO as predominantly left-brained. SEO tactics tend to rely heavily on data and numerical figures. We lean into technical know-how and keyword optimization. Logically, we react to what the numbers are telling us and decide the next steps accordingly. It’s a proven approach.  

But what about the people driving that data? What about their intent? Can we use more creative thinking to pursue better optimization strategies? 

When it comes to SEO, our goal is not really to gain the coveted top blue link. It’s about reaching the right people and addressing their needs by giving what they want as quickly and as easily as possible.

So, how do we reach that goal?

Users are always looking to do something, whether it’s finding information, being entertained or purchasing a product. How do we tap into emotional and behavioral data to support them?

That’s where design thinking comes in. 

What is design thinking?

Design thinking is exactly what it sounds like: adopting a designer mindset. 

It’s a human-centered framework for problem-solving the way a designer would – by setting out to solve a problem using creativity rather than data alone.

The design thinking process is typically divided into five stages:

• Test and evaluate

With design thinking, the emphasis is not only on the solution but also on the end user.

SEO specifically focuses on providing the best solution for a specific audience. It’s about understanding user intent and adding value. 

Get the daily newsletter search marketers rely on.

A new optimization process 

1. empathize: get to know your audience.

Empathizing in this context is centered around identifying and understanding your audience.

The best SEO strategy optimizes for consumer discovery by understanding the people who are searching. This ensures you’re adding value to users and ultimately growing your audience through increased organic visibility. 

Conduct thorough research to learn about your existing audience and gain insights into search behaviors, motivations and pain points. 

There are a number of tools available to help research your target audience. Using Google Analytics to understand who is coming to your site is a great place to start.

In GA4, you can view audience reports under User > User Attributes to identify location, gender, age, language and even interests when available. 

You can also leverage Google Trends, Facebook Audience Manager and persona mapping or survey tools to learn more about your potential audience.

Gathering this information helps tailor efforts from keyword selection to content creation and off-page efforts. When your SEO strategy is anchored in reaching an audience you fully understand, you can reach them more efficiently.

Dig deeper: An SEO guide to audience research and content analysis

2. Define: What problem are we trying to solve 

The next step involves analyzing your audience data to define the SEO challenges you aim to address. This is critical to ensure you address the real wants and needs of the audience through SEO efforts rather than working from assumptions like search volume or clicks. 

Based on the unique audiences you have identified, you can better determine the specific challenges you need to address and how to reach users. Consider:

• What messaging and terminology is most likely to resonate with your target audience?
• Are users struggling to find relevant information on your website? 
• Are there gaps in your content that need to be filled?
• Based on location, what search engines are audiences using beyond Google? Yandex, Baidu, DuckDuckGo?
• Based on age and gender, what non-traditional search engines do you need to consider? TikTok, YouTube, Amazon, Pinterest? 

Clearly defining the problem allows you to focus your efforts on the areas that will impact your SEO performance most.

3. Ideate: How can we best solve that problem?

With a clear understanding of the SEO challenge, brainstorm as many potential solutions as possible. It’s easy to fall into the same pattern of optimizing your site based on analytics data and search trends, but with design thinking, we emphasize qualitative data over quantitative data.   

A few different brainstorming techniques to help transcend your left-brained thinking habits include:

• Brainwriting : Everyone in the group writes down three ideas related to the challenge. From there, everyone passes their ideas on to the person next to them to elaborate on the thought starters and add strategies or tactics. This process repeats until the ideas have been passed around the entire group. Ultimately, everyone has contributed to each idea.
• Starbursting : Given a specific idea or strategy, create a six-point star around the idea, posing the questions who, what, when, where, why and how. Focusing on these key elements for each idea encourages the team to think about value and execution.

Think outside the box and consider how to create value for your audience through content, website updates, or user experience. In this exercise, quantity is key – use cross-functional thinking to generate ample diverse ideas.

• Is content expansion something that could help address your challenge?
• Do you need additional content that addresses a pain point?
• Do you need to improve the ease with which users find existing content? 
• Should social media be considered to increase visibility and extend reach?
• Are there PR tactics that could help generate earned coverage (i.e., inbound links and brand mentions)?
• Would other media, such as video, webinars or podcasts, potentially help address the need? 

Maybe traditional SEO tactics will help solve your particular challenge. But oftentimes, by integrating cross-channel tactics, you can better tackle SEO challenges and add value for users.

Dig deeper: SEO planning: Your one-page SEO plan

4. Prototype: Build the thing 

Before implementing any SEO strategy or tactics at scale, create “prototypes” to visualize and test your ideas.

Visualization is crucial in understanding how a strategy may address the problem or challenge. However, your prototype does not have to be a high-fidelity visual asset.

This could involve:

• Updating keyword maps and topic clusters.
• Drafting sample content pieces.
• Creating mock-ups of new features.
• Developing wireframes for website updates. 

In many cases, fancy tools and a team of engineers aren’t necessary. You can use lo-fi tools like Figma or Google Sheets to build basic prototypes that clearly convey the solution.

Whatever shape a prototype takes, keeping the unique problem or challenge in mind and relating it back to the audience is essential.

When considering the effectiveness of your prototype, use role-playing to put yourself in the shoes of the target audience. 

Dig deeper: Conveying keyword insights to non-SEOs: A visual approach

5. Test and evaluate: Does this solution work?

Design thinking makes so much sense for SEO because, much like SEO, it is an iterative process. 

The final step is to gather feedback on “prototypes” and/or tactics to refine solutions and strategies.

Intentionally test your tactics and continuously monitor performance. Leverage a modern framework for running SEO tests . Embrace a culture of experimentation to evolve your approach and better understand pain points. 

• A/B test everything from metadata to messaging to content structure.
• Leverage heat mapping to better understand how the target audience is using your website.
• Test keywords and messaging using Google Ads.
• Consider usability testing through a tool such as Hotjar or UserTesting. 
• Actively seek feedback on your site’s design, layout and functionality via surveys.

Changes in user behavior are more directly and immediately measurable than traditional SEO KPIs.

By testing with real users, you can gather feedback early in the process and make necessary adjustments along the way.

Creative problem-solving for SEO

Remember, it all starts with redefining the problems we are trying to solve.

Reframing SEO challenges around the target audiences’ needs and challenges allows us to better give people what they want.

When your SEO efforts are focused on the right audience, it’s easier to reach them. Traffic increases, which leads to more conversions.

Use design thinking to balance the analytical and creative sides of SEO. It can help you better understand when to use data, ignore trends and take risks, ultimately letting you create more user-centric and impactful SEO campaigns.