The structure of problem solving

I have the overall impression that in business, in the West, if a problem arises, the culprit is sought, hounded, blamed and sacked; whereas, in Japan, they discover how the problem arose, so that they can ensure that it can never happen again. This latter solution strikes me as being rather more sensible because problems have a time line; in other words, the problem that exists now has its roots in the past, and will have effects in the future - so sacking the culprit now may look good to outsiders, but the solution it ain't. Problems can also be perceived from different angles. There's your side of the story, there's my side of the story and there's the observer's side of the story; and - as sure as eggs is eggs - they will all be different. The third dimension of the problem is the logical levels we looked at earlier. All the 'wh' questions. Gregory Bateson, whom you have already met, realised that we think at different logical levels; and Robert Dilts, whom you've also met, (with the late Todd Epstein) developed Bateson's ideas still further. Once you've got the hang of it, you will realise that - like all good things - it's totally obvious and completely simple; and, like me, you'll wonder why you hadn't thought of it yourself. For those who like their information verbally: Supposing you invite me to lunch in a restaurant; I follow you there in my car, and - when we arrive in the car park - I say that I don't think much of the area. :: Will you be mortally offended? Or will you just think I'm a bit rude/weird, etc? :: (This criticism is made at the Environment level, ie 'where?!) I am now going to tell you that I thought you drove dangerously/badly on the way here. :: How will you respond to this, compared to my last criticism? :: (I am now complaining about your Behaviour, ie at the 'what?' level) Over lunch, I am going to say that you are not a sufficiently good writer to produce a decent book. :: How are you going to feel about this? :: (My barbs are now aimed at your Capability - at the 'How' level - how much closer am I getting to making you angry/upset?) Now think about something which you believe in passionately. I am going to look you straight in the eye and say I have never heard anything so stupid in my life, and I thought you were intelligent ...... how can you believe such rubbish! and so on. :: How are you going to react to this one? :: I am now attacking your beliefs - the 'whys' of your existence. And, if someone looks us straight in the eye and says 'I don't like you', this is a direct attack upon our identity - upon who we are. Let's pause for a moment and think about some of the things that we hear people saying about other people. 'He is arrogant'; 'she is impossible', and so on. They are all identity-level statements, following the verb 'to be' - whereas they are probably really about behaviours. Maybe, he doesn't stop and chat, she doesn't stop and listen - or whatever. If we make identity level statements about people (even though we do it by mistake), they are going to take them at identity level - what else would one expect? Beyond identity level we find mission. What we are doing on the planet. If I attack, say your family, or your country, or your dream for creating a better world, I could (deservedly) find myself in seriously deep water. For those who like their information pictorially, here is my version of Robert Dilts's structure of (Design by AuthorDocs) the logical levels. If you start in the middle at Identity, you can see how who we are is based on a collection of beliefs and values. For example, and explorer might base his identity upon the beliefs that there are more wondrous things in the world than he will find at home; that we can learn from other cultures; that we can learn a lot about our own country by exploring other countries, and so on. These beliefs are based on a set of capabilities; maybe our explorer is a wonderful linguist; maybe she is a brilliant organiser; maybe he is an outstanding leader; maybe she is a brilliant anthropologist (I realise I am using identity level statements here to describe capabilities - it's such an easy trap to fall into). Each capability is based on a series of behaviours: maybe the person who can learn foreign languages with great ease listens; steps into the other person's shoes; copies the way the other person moves their face and body in order to pronounce words or expressions. And the behaviours depend on the environment: the wheres and whens. The person who is good at listening may do it best when he or she feel comfortable and at ease; and maybe at certain times of day. Who knows? We are all different. And remember, we all have different identities in different situations. At this moment, I am a writer and a neuro-linguistic programmer - whereas the dog has just burst in to remind me that, in another identity, I am a dog walker. Laurence Dreyfuss (the French nursery school teacher who suddenly found her classroom invaded by a gunman, and the children hostages) never forgot for one moment that her identity in that crisis was as their teacher. Her identity as a wife and a mother did not come into the equation: she was the person the children knew best; the person they trusted to get them out safely. Despite frequent offers to replace her, she stayed with her charges to the end. She was subsequently awarded the légion d'honneur for her courage. So where is this side-track leading us? Let me tell you a story about a problem that I unwittingly created. I was running a workshop on learning for a collection of trainers. It was going very well, they appeared to be enjoying themselves and were asking very good questions. I, too, was enjoying myself and - as a throwaway remark - I said: 'When I rule the world, cookery and chemistry will be taught together.' There was an explosion from the far end of the room. There was a guy, shaking with rage, telling me that he had enjoyed the session, that he thought what I had said made good sense, but I had just ruined everything by making a stupid remark like that. 'Let me tell you', he said, pointing his finger at me, 'that I am a chemist. And I can assure you that chemistry has nothing whatever to do with cooking.' I reeled at the unexpected onslaught, apologised and said that I was just a cook, and that cooking had everything to do with chemistry. But he wasn't having that, and went raging on. The rest of the participants took him apart, which was a shame - because it was me who had set it up - by unwittingly e quating his identity as a chemist with a female behaviour called cooking. Back to problems. Nobody goes to war - or gets divorced - about behaviours: it is the effect of those behaviours on people's beliefs, identities and missions that create the conflict. Going by to my neurosis about people who don't return my calls: it makes me feel as though I and my business don't matter, and that's why I won't work with them. It's a beliefs/identity/mission question. Think about things that people do which upset you. Then ask yourself whether it is really a belief, identity or mission question - rather than about behaviour. Does leaving the lid off the toothpaste really prove that he or she does not love you? Or do you just notice that the lid is not on the toothpaste again? What would be a useful way to react to finding the tube and lid separated in the future? And what stops you from reacting in this useful way - instead of going bananas, feeling like an insignificant worm, wanting to scream, or however you normally react to this particular piece of behaviour? I did a fascinating survey of businesses large and small - from multi-nationals to three-man bands, and asked the question: 'what stops life at work from being as simple, as productive, as fulfilling and as much fun as you would like it to be?' and the answers were almost inevitably 'people', followed by 'lack of time' and 'stress'. This is hardly surprising because - without people - there would be no business. Business is supposed to be an entirely logical process: do a, b and c, and x, y and will happen. But, as you and I know, this is rubbish. Bateson describes dealing with people as the equivalent of trying to play snooker with mice. Given the laws of physics: if we hit a snooker ball in a certain way, we can more or less predict where it will go - substitute an inanimate ball with a living thing and anything could happen! Humans think - there is no getting away from it. So it is useful to know, at least, the structure of our thinking. Here is Robert and Todd's Jungle Gym: their three-dimensional version of the structure of a problem. It may be big to fit on your screen, so - if it drive you mad - you might like to print it out. Press here to see it on a separate page for printing. (Design by AuthorDocs) As you will see, there is the timeline we talked about: :: the past, :: present and :: future constituents of our problem. There are also the three different perceptual positions: :: Mine: 1st :: The other person's: 2nd :: The outsider's: 3rd And then we have the five logical levels of thinking. This gives us 45 different positions from which we can review the problem! (I use white ping-pong balls for the problem spaces, and coloured balls for the solution spaces) Let's go back to the high-rise flat you have found me, in which I am installed with all my children, dogs and goat: :: It's my problem: 1st position :: It is Now: Present :: It is a 'where' problem: Environment-level Place three white balls in the appropriate holes In the future, it is going to become a Behaviour-level problem: the goat is going to eat the furnishings; all the animals are going to make a hideous mess; the children are going to find it very cramped and will probably fight over space. If I go into 2nd position with the rest of the ménage, it may well become an Identity level problem for the animals: they won't be able (Capability) to do all the things they naturally do in this restricted space, and this may affect who they are. I may also have problems with my neighbours (2nd position, Future) - and so on. The question is: how am I thinking about the problem now? As you saw, it is lst position, Present, Environment-level. However, I might be busy blaming you, thinking you had done it on purpose to upset me - because you don't like me. This immediately takes it into 2nd position Beliefs , and lst position Identity-levels, Past, Present and Future - which makes it appear much more dangerous to me; and I will be less likely to be able to think rationally about it at these levels, because they are altogether too threatening. If I am thinking usefully, the first priority is to get the problem sorted - ie find somewhere else to live. Then comes the question of how it arose, so that I do not create more problems of this sort, for myself. Obviously, it arose in the past: we got our wires crossed: Behaviour. So what capabilities and/or beliefs created this behaviour? What would an outsider say? (3rd position) - and so on (we can use the coloured balls to show which spaces we have explored). The more we explore the problem from all the different positions, the more evident the solution will become. Play around in the Jungle Gym, and see what you discover. My friend Sid Jacobson has written a wonderful book called SOLUTION STATES - published by The Anglo-American Book Company (click to order direct from them) which is all about problem solving. He tells me that before AA Books, no other publisher would look at it. I was delighted (rather perversely) by this news, because it proved two of my theories: (a) a lot of publishers don't know which side their bread is buttered and (b) AA Books know how to think usefully. SOLUTION STATES is the book I wish I'd written.