{"id":11,"date":"2007-01-22T10:39:39","date_gmt":"2007-01-22T15:39:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ashokkarania.com\/blog\/?p=11"},"modified":"2007-01-22T10:39:39","modified_gmt":"2007-01-22T15:39:39","slug":"the-art-of-problem-solving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/the-art-of-problem-solving\/","title":{"rendered":"The Art of Problem Solving"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Art of Problem Solving: 5 Steps to Success<\/p>\n<p>Problem Solving Skills are one of the key pre-requisites for success in today&#8217;s competitive corporate world. If you can analyze a situation, create different scenarios, visualize implications of different alternatives, choose the optimum alternative and execute if flawlessly, you will have people eating out of your hands. Even at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.magnettechnologies.com\">Magnet<\/a>, we look for people who are part of solution, rather than stuck in problem maze.<\/p>\n<p>Problem Solving Skills can be groomed over a period of time. What is needed is the attitude and discipline and above all, the love to combat the problem and derive a solution.<\/p>\n<p>I found a good article by Lyndsay Swinton of &#8216;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.mftrou.com\">Management for the rest of us<\/a>&#8216; on Problem Solving Skills. Here it is:<\/p>\n<p>Legendary problem solver Albert Einstein was onto something hot when he said &#8220;No problem is solved from the same consciousness that created it&#8221;. He knew about the art of problem solving and if he&#8217;d written about it, he may have broken it down into these 5 easy to follow problem solving steps.<\/p>\n<p>1. Flexible mind, flexible solutions<br \/>\n&#8220;Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it is the only one you have&#8221;. Now I&#8217;d like to claim that for myself, but a good lady called Emile Chartier said it before me. Beware when you only have one solution to a problem. It either means you don&#8217;t understand the problem or you&#8217;ve not taken the time to figure out more creative, more likely to succeed, solutions.<\/p>\n<p>2. It&#8217;s all in the mind<br \/>\nYour mental state is inextricably linked to your physical state, so if you&#8217;ve reached mental gridlock, take a physical break to get the thought traffic moving again. Go for a walk, listen to music, tidy up your desk or do whatever it takes to free your mind and open up your mind to creating new, innovative solutions to your problem.<\/p>\n<p>3. Why oh why oh why?<br \/>\nAsk yourself, why is this a problem? And ask again. And again. Like a stuck record, repeatedly asking why, allows you to pin point with much more precision and accuracy why the problem is a problem. And it busts myths and assumptions until all you&#8217;re left with are a few lonely, useful facts.<\/p>\n<p>4. Rose coloured glasses<br \/>\nDescribe your problem to your mum. Then describe it to your 6 year old nephew. And do another version for your boss. Bet the problem was different each time you talked about it. Taking a different perspective on a problem can lead you to a solution (particularly 6 year olds, as they are some of the most straight-talking magical thinkers around!). If you want to get fancy, you can call this problem solving step &#8220;re-framing&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>5. Dream a little dream<br \/>\nYou probably wrote fantastical stories as a child that ended &#8220;and then I woke up!&#8221; You crossed rivers, fought dangerous fights and saved the day. In dream-land there are no limits, no boundaries or limits on resources. If there were a magic wand that would solve your problem, what would that be like? Describe in great detail what you see, hear and feel about this problem free state. It&#8217;s an engaging and powerful mental game to play, and increases your chance of solving the problem many times over.<br \/>\n<a rel=\"tag\" href=\"http:\/\/technorati.com\/tag\/Problem+Solving+Skills\" \/><br \/>\n<a rel=\"tag\" href=\"http:\/\/technorati.com\/tag\/Management\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Art of Problem Solving: 5 Steps to Success Problem Solving Skills are one of the key pre-requisites for success in today&#8217;s competitive corporate world. If you can analyze a situation, create different scenarios, visualize implications of different alternatives, choose the optimum alternative and execute if flawlessly, you will have people eating out of your [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-career"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ashok-karania-wordpress.staging9.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}