Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Building Problem Solving Teams

One of the key goals of interviewing with empathy is to understand the client's motivations. That can be a very difficult if you don't truly understand their points of view, particularly when they seem to be very different from your own.

What if there were just three things you needed to understand to discover why anyone acts the way they do?

We've already talked about two of them; tolerance, for ambiguity and complexity. The third is called cognitive bias. It's a measure of risk tolerance, which a blend of tolerance for ambiguity and complexity, past experiences and future expectations. As we learned earlier, these traits have their roots in different parts of our brains and how those parts interact has a huge effect on learning and decision making.

Ichak Adzies developed a useful framework of four decision making styles, which he mapped against Approach, Focus, Pace and Perspective.


These scales were picked because they illustrate what Adzies thought were built-in conflicts in decision making processes. They also pivot around where on the ambiguity, complexity and optimism scales someone naturally falls.
  • Slow, Process Driven <--------------> Fast, Results Oriented
  • Chaotic - Other Centered <-----> Structured - Self Centered

These scale parings have some built in assumptions which Design Thinking addresses head on by flipping the Pace and Perspective pairings towards the goal of creating a faster, process driven approach with a structured, other-centered perspective;

The implications of this insight are both obvious and interesting;
  1. The more selfish someone is the more impatient they are.
  2. Solving complex, ambiguous problems takes time and help from other people.
  3. User-Centered Persistent Optimists rule the problem solving roost.
From the Design Thinking framework we know that positive/negative bias, or optimism plays a crucial role in how we learn and problem solve. When things seem simple, clear, likely and positive, we feel good. When things seem ambiguous, complex and risky, we feel anxious, confused and fearful.

In the context of Empathic Inquiry what we need to remember is that different people interpret the same set of circumstances differently depending on their tolerance for ambiguity and complexity and their degree of optimism. We need to recognize that without having our objectivity influenced by it.

So, are there any quick ways that we can get a read on where in this universe of decision making styles someone naturally falls? Here are a few ideas, questions to ask yourself, or someone else, and some elements to notice about your own or others' environments (homes or office spaces).
  1. Do you feel the world is basically a safe or a scary place?
  2. Do you like to be spontaneous or does there always need to be a plan?
  3. Is your desk or workbench organized or cluttered?
  4. Do you prefer company or being alone?
  5. Do unfinished things drive you crazy?
  6. Is "slack time" restful or a punishment?
What we are interested in is determining how exposure to ambiguity and complexity makes you and others feel.  This manifests itself in things like attention to detail and how clean and organized personal spaces are. Patience and level of optimism another are two other good indicators.

By the way, these traits are expressed and illustrated nicely in the characters of one of my favorite stories;  Winnie-the-Pooh.

How would these traits be useful in building problem solving (Design Thinking) teams?


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