![]() Page 2 of 2 Step Three: Setting values Within your groups of 3-6, as rapidly as possible determine with each Post-It entry what the impact of solving the problem would be on the (perceived short-term) interests of each. Do this by means of "Quick-Vote."As each entry is read aloud, within 3 seconds everyone in your group "votes" his/her estimate by holding up or down 0, 1, 2 or 3 fingers. A positive impact on the entry's perceived short-term interests is signified by the fingers held upward; an adverse or negative effect by the fingers held downward. In either case, the greater the perceived short-term impact on the entry's interests, the more the number of fingers held out accordingly.
Continue until all Post-It entries are posted somewhere on the sheet or board at some
valence level. ![]() Step Four: Examine Analyze your sheet or board, with this concept in mind: Entries above the 0-line (those with positive valences) are your potential sources of support for a solution. Below that neutral 0-line, entries with negative valences are likely to be somehow involved in the defeat of attempted solutions (and policies and courses of action). Of special interest: swiftly review and analyze your "squiggle" and asterisk entries. In some special cases you may want to recap the above 3 steps in miniature, to identify elements within that special entrythese can be especially illuminating! You may also discover key aspects of the problem situation from examining some of the
possible relationships between entries, on and off the board or sheet. Especially
focus on how a change in one might affect another. ![]() Step Five: Win-Win Finder Determine what changes or "sweeteners" would need to be added to the plan or solution or policy or course of action, to bring more entries topside your 0-line (making their perceived short-term interest impact positive). To what extent will the cost of those sweeteners subtract from some of your support? Start tinkering with the solution(s) or policy in such a way as to see if you can turn all valences positive and still have a distinctive thrust of solution. It's crucial to begin making such changes or adding such sweeteners, if you are to emerge with a solution which will generate broad enough support to be a solution. One experimental group, in fact, which up to this point had performed brilliantly, froze on its initial solutions without even beginning to explore such changes to those perfect jewels of resolutionand was the only such group not to develop at least the beginnings of an emergent genuine solution. (Even the several groups which ran out of time were clearly en route to an effective solution.) If, as you check out these sweeteners, your solution is beginning to look a bit thin, your policy expensive or shaky, you may want to take a picture of the current configuration of your sheet or board, then try a different proposed solution or policy. Go quickly as possible on each entry interest, to get a group-averaged estimate as to possible change from old to proposed new solution impacting on that entry's perceived short-term interests. This is also your opportunity to get someone's "pet solution" run and out of
the way. The more important a problem is, the likelier you will have people who have
pet solutions to it. To free their full attention for the ultimate
solution-finding, as soon as possible after running such a pet solution through the
valences and down the tubes, start running another proposed solution through the valences. ![]() Design Objective Find a solution which constitutes a win/win for all concerned, if possible even in the short runand definitely a win/win for all in the long run. The extent to which the eventual solution falls short of that objective is the measure of the cost in power, force or extraordinary persuasion which would be required to implement that solution or policy. If that solution is not universally win/win, it must be at least close enough that sufficient support will be generated to supply special or compensatory incentive to those factors which otherwise would not be sharing in the win. If your solution cannot generate that much support, it probably is not a good enough solution. Seek another which is. Example: One suggested idea for finding a cure for AIDS faster (or any seemingly incurable fatal disease which still leaves mental faculties relatively in good order) would be: to staff an entire major research center (and dedicated funding commitment) with medically qualified researchers who are themselves AIDS victimsand turn them loose on the problem. However More generally, this example suggests, in broad outline at least, a strategy which might be used to rapidly find cures for most remaining incurable diseases, some of which have been around with billions in research and treatment spent on them, for a long time and with a tremendous extent of human suffering. ![]() Step Six (if needed): If all your major solutions and policies have shown up bankrupt, then brainstorm in your group all possible solutions to the problem without regard to acceptability or suitability, to flush new options into view. The "support-first" rule is back in effect. Try for 40, 50, 100 solution suggestions. Quickly pick out the most interesting ideas from the list, and/or bunch them. Give special attention to that idea which was first greeted with a burst of laughter, since that often turns out to be the best idea. If no one idea emerges "head and shoulders" above the rest, use whatever quick sort-down method can get you to the 2-3 most interesting solution possibilities within 3 minutes or so. Configure each on your sheet or board as above, then look for the least expensive sweeteners which will bring virtually everyone above the 0-line. Also, on each of these, Remember that any problem-solving formula or method "is a tool, not a rule;". Its purpose is to expand perception over facets which otherwise might not get noticed and which just might possibly contain your winning answer. Sometimes, pointing in one direction is what brings another direction into view. In the long run, not the method but you make the decisions. ![]() Step Seven: Select Choose the preferred solution. Improve further on it. Design a step-by-step sequence of operations which will cause it to be implemented, a series of specific steps culminating in completion of the solving of that problem. Your steps need to be concrete enough, specific enough, that you will readily know when each is completed or that it is not. Pinpoint each step in sequence or time. Make sure you've accounted for First Step. (What's First Step? If there's anything which has to be done before that step, then it's not First Step, so what is First Step?) In other words, generalities may point the direction, but solutions happen only through concrete specific steps. ![]()
For quick reference: Complex Homeostasis the behavior of systems
![]() Comments to Win Wenger
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