#ThinkfullyHabit: Flip the problem
Are you someone who tends to jump straight in to solve a problem? Or do you step back and sense check what the problem is about first? You may well be familiar with Einstein’s famous quote,"If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about solutions.” But what should you actually do in those 55 minutes? Flipping the problem around may be one of the best ways to spend that time.
“If a problem can’t be solved within the frame it was conceived, the solution lies in reframing the problem.”
WHY?
Take the example of the inventor Eli Whitney who at the time of the Industrial Revolution was trying to make the production of cotton more profitable*. The problem was that removing the little seeds within cotton was hard to do and very time consuming. The solution at the time was to painstakingly remove the seeds by hand, one plant at a time. Whitney wanted to build a machine that would more effectively remove the seeds from the cotton plants. He found inspiration in the strangest of places**.
One day as he was chatting over the fence to someone who had a chicken coop near their house, he saw a cat trying to pull a chicken through the side of the cage. The cat totally failed, but it did manage to get some feathers. An idea struck Whitney forcibly in that moment – and one which totally flipped the cotton problem on its head. Instead of removing the seeds from the cotton, the solution would instead come from removing the cotton from the seeds.
This encounter triggered the development of the 'cotton gin'; a machine which became one of the key inventions of the Industrial Revolution. It acted just like the cat’s paw pulling at the chicken feathers since it contained tiny hooks that pulled the cotton fibres through a fine mesh, acting like a sieve. So while the seeds were too large to pass, the cotton fibres were easily pulled through. It became the efficient way to separate cotton from the seeds.
So, if you’re facing a problem try flipping it around. For example:
- Instead of starting something, work out what needs stopping.
- Instead of finding more time, work out how to use less of your current time.
- Instead of removing something negative, try introducing something that controls it.
- Instead of changing the environment, change how you engage with that environment.
Flipping it around may give you a new way to a more effective solution. Keeping an eye out for inspiration that can come from any conversation, content or space may help you to see the problem in a different way – you never know what it might be that helps flip ideas around for them to click back into place. Don't resist turning the problem on its head – or turn your own head to look at the same problem in a different way.
REFERENCES
* Cotton Gin and Eli Whitney, HISTORY.com Editors, A&E Television Networks, Published Feb 4, 2010; Updated October 10, 2019
** Gettysburg Compiler - Google News Archive Search (April 27, 1918). "Cat Gave Him Idea". news.google.com