Part 2 - Every Problem Has a Solution

Your friends, colleagues and family like you and care about you. When you run into trouble, when you have some issue or need, they're keen to help. They're keen to advise, and solve your problem. They may even expect you to take their advice and solution, and they get annoyed if you don't.

All this, sometimes, without really grasping what your situation is or without knowing what you want to do with it.

How many times have you been in this situation? 

Jumping ahead, without knowing

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One time, I engaged a web developer to work with me on an important internet project. We had really good conversations over several weeks. So when we agreed to work together, it was exciting.  He got cracking on the logo design, first, and eagerly sent me his first "cuts." They were clever, well-created designs.  Of squares and cubes.

The issue? The shapes that fit my style best are circles and spheres and also triangles and pyramids. My conceptual models reflect more of these shapes, not squares and cubes!

The web developer pushed forward to solve a problem (i.e., how to represent my project symbolically), without grasping more specifically what I wanted.  In fact what I wanted for this particular project was an entirely different shape:  ∞ (the symbol for infinity).

We lost valuable time on the project, and it was very aggravating.  It was only one of many difficulties in his project delivery, and it was clear I had to dismiss him.

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Letting the problem speak

Let the problem “speak” for itself.  It's delving enough into a problem to understand what it's all about.

One senior manager asked me, What problem are you trying to solve? I was so excited about a program I was working on, for which I sought approval, that I neglected to clarify for him what I was actually trying to accomplish.  He needed to understand what the problem was, and more importantly he wanted to make sure I myself was clear.

So letting the problem speak means paying attention to, and reflecting on, the problem (i.e., issue, situation, or difficulty).

Second, letting the problem speak also means suspending our preconceptions about it and setting aside, at least at first, our fine arsenal of methods, techniques, and solutions. So not being hasty or premature in coming up with solutions is important for actually solving that problem.

Put differently, it's emptying our "toolkit," then letting the problem guide us on what "tools" to put in there and to use to solve it.

Some of these tools, which we need to fix a problem, we may have already. But some we may have to get, because we've never thought about it before. Some tools we may have to design and create from scratch, because it doesn't exist yet. 

My seminal thesis

In other words, there is always a solution to a problem.  I shared this seminal thesis with a fellow PhD friend, Hector, and his response was perfectly on-target. He said, "Otherwise, it's not a problem."

The solvability of any and all problems we face now, and may ever face, is a premise at the heart of Theory of Algorithms.  I'm working on the proof for this.  I don't have it completed, yet, but gradually I’m getting there. 

Every day, corporate and worldwide problems - small or large - all have solutions.

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An example 

I lived in Dubai, and I had a business meeting in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. It was a two-hour drive from my apartment to the meeting venue.

Unfortunately there was a serious accident en route, and traffic was badly snarled. Even though I left in plenty of time, it became clear that I was not going to make the meeting. I would have had to ride in a helicopter, and in that situation it was an impractical, unlikely solution.  I was aggravated and pissed off.

But what was the problem? The traffic accident prevented me from attending this meeting.

So, what was the problem, really?  Upon reflecting on this further, I reminded myself that I really wanted to participate in the discussion and the plans we were making.  The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the problem was less about the traffic snarl and more about a missed participation.

What did I do? I optimized an aggravating situation as best as I could, upon hearing the problem speak for itself, by contacting the chair, sharing my thoughts with her, and following up later on.

In the end this solution worked out perfectly fine. I missed the meeting with my colleagues in person, but I effectively solved the problem.  Plus, I saved four hours of driving and a few gallons of gasoline! 

The trouble we run into
  

It took Albert Einstein many years to work out the Theory of General Relativity, more years to correct a problem he discovered, and to arrange for its proof.

The problem? He was working out an alternative notion of gravity, that is, as a warping of time and space, different from that of Newton or Galileo. Obviously this is complex stuff, and he and other physicists have engineered comparably complex theories to help us grasp the universe better.

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In contrast, many of the problems we face in our day-to-day lives are probably simple, or at least simpler than physics. It doesn’t mean simple problems ought to be dismissed or ignored, because they can become more serious over time, if left unchecked. 

Rather, the Theory of Algorithms says that simple problems can be solved with simple solutions, but complex ones require solutions of comparable complexity.

© 2013 by Ron Villejo, PhD