How to Define a Problem?

I was watching a documentary, in which researchers were designing experiments to see the difference in intelligence among different animals and birds. The measurement of intelligence was their problem-solving skills. As one animal solved simple problems, they were given harder and more complex tasks. Some animals could complete very complex tasks, whereas others found the same tasks difficult.

Even human intelligence is measured through an IQ test which is also based upon someone’s ability to solve complex problems. The whole civilization has been built upon its population’s ability to solve a complex problem, and now we have standardized the way we teach this skill from childhood in schools, in colleges, and then professional lives.

The educational and professional institutions teach certain ways to solve certain problems, but they lack in teaching the most important step of the problem-solving skill and that skill is “how to define a problem”. Usually, in schools and colleges, the problem is given in a written format, and students are asked to solve them. The students find the correct formula to find the solution to such a problem; they are expected to show their work and the answer. These are all valid and useful steps in solving the problem, but the problems in real life are not as obvious as given in math, science, or engineering class. Students are expected to learn the real world more complex problems in the real world, and most students do exactly that in their chosen profession. One can always enhance skills in their chosen profession with experience but having greater problem-solving skills may differentiate them from the others in the same profession.

Defining a Problem

Problem-solving skills are acquired through knowledge and practice just like any other skill, and there are few steps to solve any complex problem. The first and most important step is to define the problem. It seems easy since we all define a lot of problems in our daily routine. There are days when we constantly find ourselves in difficult situations. It could be that the alarm clock did not go off and there was too much traffic; a very important class or the meeting was missed. It could be the appliance in your house malfunctioned so you lost all the stored food or couldn’t take a shower due to lack of hot water on a cold day. So, you could be sitting with a friend or a colleague and talking about these problems of your day, but that is not what I mean when I am talking about the problem definition.

During lunch, one of my colleagues (let’s call him John) mentioned that he was the late third time this month because he only had one bathroom in the house. His wife just started a new job last month and both of his kids now go to school. One bathroom in the morning is not enough to cater to the needs of his whole family morning, so a few days a month he is running late. Not a big deal now, but he is worried that in the future it could cause an embarrassing situation.

Let’s take this scenario and try to define the problem; John defined his problem as a lack of a bathroom in his house. Do you agree with him? He has been living in this house for five years, kids were younger back then and his wife stayed home, so he never had any problem in the morning. Do you have any problems any other time of the day with only having one bathroom?  He answered with a negative headshake to my question. So, his problem was that he needed an additional bathroom in the morning and no other time; you may think that if there is an additional bathroom there, it will be there at all times and not just in the morning, so John’s original problem definition is correct even if he only needs one in the morning. Let’s think outside the box and say if his wife started working from home, or the kids were homeschooled, would he still need another bathroom? Even if he was able to work from home or find a different job that required him to come later than his usual time, he may not need another bathroom.

The problem at hand was never him lacking the bathroom space in his home, but the problem was he was coming to work late, because of the lack of bathrooms in his house. Now that we have defined the problem, there may be multiple solutions, for example:

i-                   Building another bathroom in the house

ii-                  Selling the house and buying a new house with two or more bathrooms

iii-                Changing his job

iv-                Wife getting a new job

v-                  Negotiating a new arrival time at the office at his current job

vi-                Coming to work early

There are plenty of other solutions to solve his problem, but as you can see if the problem was defined as lack of bathrooms in his house, you may have a few solutions (building a new bathroom or buying a house with two or more bathrooms) but defining the problem as him being late from office brought more solutions in hand. We will not be talking about solution analysis now, but this may be a topic for our future conversations.

In defining a problem for problem-solving purposes, one must be able to answer the following questions:

Who? What? When? How?

In our given problem, we will attempt to answer those questions:

i-                   Who? The problem is happening to John, so the answer will be John.

ii-                  What? He was late from work three times.

iii-                When? Within last month

iv-                How?  Lack of bathroom in the house caused him to be late.

We will write the problem statement as:

John was late from work three times within last month because he could not get ready on time due to one shared bathroom among four people in his house.

We will discuss in future next steps about the problem-solving skills, please use this newly learned skill in your daily lives. It will help you find clarity in your daily tasks, and you may see problems at hand from different angles.