Problem Solving & Decision Making · Lesson 5

Creative Problem Solving

beginner⏱ 17 min · 7 cards

The big idea

💡

When you have one solution, you have none

The first idea arrives fast, feels sufficient, and then absorbs all the effort that should have gone into finding a better one.

Try it

“Build more meeting rooms.”

Meeting rooms are always booked. Which of these is a new option?

Tell a genuinely different option from a variation on the same one.

Reframing moves

Tap each.

The format that performs worst

Nominal groups — the same people generating alone, pooled afterwards — reliably produce more and better ideas than a live brainstorm.

Production blocking, evaluation apprehension, social loafing, and anchoring on the first idea voiced. Generate alone, then pool, then build together.

Nuance

Maester Note

Judgement during generation kills half-formed ideas — and the half-formed idea is often the one worth building on.

Quick check

You did it

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