At Work Newswire

By D. Quinn Mills

Managers looking for a novel solution to a problem must become creative decision makers.

The right side of the brain is always processing information even when we are not conscious of it, and so we can learn from it if we can bring that thinking into our conscious minds. If we make right-side thinking conscious, we can surface valuable associative and integrative ideas. Since the right-side of the brain is associated with pattern-recognition and creativity, it is thought that by focusing less on formal analysis (the left-brain’s strength) and more on right-brain activities, managers can reach more creative solutions.

There are numerous means of trying to reach the right-brain. For example, many managers use exercise to get in touch with their right-brain thinking, relinquishing their left-brain analytic focus. Similarly, a manager will say that he got a great idea while shaving; or having her hair done. The point is to escape the limitations of analytic approaches to decision-making, to let some imagination creep in.

There are other means of creative problem-solving than reaching to the right-brain for inspiration, effective though it may be. Perhaps surprisingly, one of the most effective means of creative problem-solving is an almost completely analytic process, but one which is rarely commented upon or used.

Its primary exponent in recent decades was a physicist who was perhaps the most creative thinker of the twentieth century: Richard Feynman, a MIT-trained physicist who taught for many years at Cal Tech. A key contributor to the development of quantum mechanics, which he referred to as “the jewel in the crown of physics,” he was also a world-renowned resource for physicists and mathematicians trying to resolve difficult problems in their fields.

What was the source of his astonishing skills of creative problem-solving? Those who knew him described him as having an “unstuck mind.” What they meant was that he was able to escape the mental trap into which so many of us fall of trying to approach a problem in a pre-disposed way.

Feynman had a method for resolving difficult problems. From years of experience with various sorts of problems he had a memory of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of techniques for resolving difficulties. When confronted with a new problem, he’d start to sift through the many techniques with which he was familiar until he’d finally find one that either applied directly or could be modified to successfully fit the problem at hand. In this way his mind was completely unstuck.

But note that his method was not at all a matter of inspiration—it was a thoroughly analytic shifting of alternatives and measure of their potential success in application. It was a left-brained approach that led to very creative solutions. (For more on Feynman, see James Gleick’s 1992 book, Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman).

Employing the Feynman method

Each of us could employ Feynman’s method. It’s a matter of memory, and of mental discipline. Faced with a problem that refuses to yield to the expected approach, we should pull our minds back and ask: what if I were to approach it as I did another problem that on its surface seemed very different?

For example, faced with a problem with a supplier, and looking for the correct decision, and unable to find it in the way we usually deal with suppliers, we might ask ourselves, “What if we thought of the supplier as a customer? How might I handle the problem then?” Or, we might ask, “What if we thought of the supplier as an employee? How might we handle the problem then?” And from this process might emerge a novel solution to the problem.

The key to dealing with a difficult problem, Feynman demonstrated to us, is not impatience, but flexibility in the approaches we try. Put differently, Feynman was a genius at generating alternatives for problem-solving; while, as we’ve noted before, many managers are unwilling or unable to generate more than a single possible solution.

This is an excerpt from D. Quinn Mills’s book “Principles of Management” (MindEdge Press, 2006). Mills, the Alfred J. Weatherhead Jr. Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School (emeritus), consults with major corporations in the U.S. and globally. He has written extensively on leadership, strategy, and management issues.

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Copyright © 2007 D. Quinn Mills

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