Build Your Employee Skills With These Three Easy to Use Problem Solving Techniques

By Jan Delmas

Businesses create innovations and build their futures by having good problem solving skills among their employees. Once you have identified an area to improve on, decide how to phrase your problem. Gather a creative team of people from different areas of expertise, and use any of the three techniques outlined below to find creative solutions to the problem.

Each of these techniques provides different perspectives and ways of looking at the problem to end with creative and practical solutions.

Technique 1 - Random Input

This is a great technique to use to kick start a brainstorm session with your team. Select a random noun from the dictionary or a word list. Use this noun as the starting point for brainstorming. At first, you may find that the ideas just do not seem to solve the problem, but persistence will pay off with new insights into your problem.

As an example of this technique, a factory business is trying to solve the problem of pollution emissions escaping into the air. A team with various experts is gathered to generate ideas. As part of the brainstorm session, the facilitator introduces the noun "Plant" and asks for suggestions that use this idea to solve the problem.

Ideas raised in the brainstorm included:

* planting trees near the emission outlet
* passing emission gasses through a soup of algae prior to release, and
* gathering the emissions and sending them to another type of 'plant' - a factory, to filter the emissions and create carbon products.

Technique 2 - SCAMPER

SCAMPER is an acronym that stands for Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate and Reverse. For each part of the acronym, ask your team to consider how these answers could solve the problem.

If you are looking at coming up with a new product that is cheaper to produce, you may look at:

* substituting a different material for the product (eg laminate instead of wood),
* combining the product with another one to create a tool with multiple uses (think swiss army knife),
* adapting the existing product (eg adding in mp3 player to the stereo) ,
* modifying the equipment or production line to increase efficiency,
* finding other uses for the same product to sell to different markets,
* eliminating the most expensive piece to produce or eliminating part of the product (eg a stereo without a turntable), and
* reversing the order of manufacture to prevent double handling.

Technique 3 - Problem Reversal

This technique can have terrific results because it allows people to brainstorm in a new way. Basically, the initial problem is reversed and then the team generates ideas to solve the reverse problem. You may just be surprised at the results!

This technique works because it throws people a bit off balance and into the unexpected at the start of the brainstorm session. This helps creative juices to start flowing.

For example, your business wants to increase customer satisfaction. Instead of trying to brainstorm ways of increasing customer satisfaction, the facilitator chooses to reverse the problem and asks the team for ideas on how the company could decrease customer satisfaction.

Ideas given may include:

* Opening late and closing early,
* Not answering telephones,
* Having products that break easily,
* Not giving information to the customer, and
* Not providing a warranty.

Once you have brainstormed the reverse problem, reverse the answers to see if any match the initial problem. From the example above, you could start working in shifts to open earlier and close later than your competition to increase customer satisfaction.

Using these techniques will enhance any brainstorming sessions and will provide different perspectives, which often lead the way into creating innovations that set your business apart.

Build Your Employee Skills With These Three Easy to Use Problem Solving Techniques