Reframing
(⚠️ Work in progress ⚠️)
During my master thesis, I worked with the most waterfall person ever. When we are both working on the case, we often entered long discussions in approaching the case.
From the quote “The best writing is rewriting.” – E. B. White 1, I question wether the best framing is reframing. In an university experiment, a fellow student and I investigated different problem solving strategies.
We investigated different problem solving stragies. I wanted to be more open to other strategies, learn more of others and not be rusted up by my own strategies.Over the last two years working “agile” to some extent became normal for me.
improving in how to deal with discussions and conflicting views will not only help me this case, but will help you in any future teamwork.
To better understand, we played a senario game. We talked for 1 hour long about how we should tackle grocery shopping, planning holidays, and moving a couch from and into a one-story high apartment.
The different problem solving stragies
The discussions where on two dimensions:
- Bottom-up vs Top-Down 2
- Going with the flow vs Maximum control
Especially the moving couch scenario makes our approaches really clear. I expected X and I differ in approach, in which X is working Top-Down with maximum control, while I am going with the flow and working bottom-up. I got indeed the same outcome as the expected.
would plan in advance how to move the couch around each obstacle, whereas I would focus on getting past the first obstacle before considering the next steps. X’ approach is strategic, while I prefer an adaptive and incremental approach.
Outcomes
Both approaches are well-suited to solve problems and have their own flaws. For example, in my approach the couch can get stuck in the middle in the process as the corridor is too small. The chance the couch moves in the wrong room seems also higher, demanding a higher physical effort. However, in X approach a larger mental effort is needed upfront and the chance of the couch not being moved before midnight, because of unexpected obstacles, is higher.
A combination of both approaches seems also desired, making each segment depend on which effort is more desired. This shows diverging strategies might help to reach the desired outcome faster and that divergent approaches should be embraced instead of rejected.
Using different strategies for different scenarios is desired: X for example will also go with the flow in planning a holiday as he does not want to put in the mental effort as the goal of taking a holiday is relaxation.
It is difficult to measure progression as X approach is maybe slower to start but can move faster in the end to reach the finish line (the couch moved). My approach can be faster-paced at the start, but can be really slow when foreseeable obstacles are met. I notion that efficiency of the problem solving style can only be determined when the problem is solved, not during the process itself.
References
Footnotes
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I saw the quote “The best writing is rewriting.” at Paul Graham. The meaning of the quote is more clear after reading this article. ↩