Problem Solving and Decision making

What is the most important step in problem solving?

Is it making a decision?

Answer is NO.

Decision making is just a part of problem solving. Yes it is important and crucial step in problem solving but not the most important.

Steps involved in problem solving are shown in figure.

Steps in Problem Solving

 Each step shown above is dialectic in nature. This helps in exploring new ideas, scrutinizing them and then accepting them, which leads to continuous improvement. 

• Situation analysis:

           - Valuing and examining situation: Analysing the situation and detecting the     problem. 

           - Priority setting: This involves listing down the problem and prioritizing problems according to the impact it has on process.

• Problem Analysis:

           - Defining problem: After prioritizing, select and define most crucial problem considering all parameters.

           - Collecting information: Collect all relevant information regarding defined problem.  

• Solution Analysis:

           - Brainstorming: This involves generating new ideas. All possible solutions are brainstormed. 

           - Decision making: Out of all ideas presented, choose best suitable idea is in order to reach the optimum solution.

• Implementation Analysis:

           - Participation: In order to implement the decision made, involve others to work towards goal.

           - Planning: Structurize the solution and construct a plan to implement the solution.

Thus, while solving any problem, manager has to play different roles at different point of time. This can be explained from the figure below:

Problems faced by manager are of different types, those can be classified as:

• Urgent and important problems: Action to be taken fastly for urgent problems. While in case of Important problems, as impact on process is high, higher priority should be given to such problems

• Rich and poor people's problem: Management generally tends to address rich people's problems and ignore poor people's problem.

• Simple and complex problem: No problem is simple or complex. It is the approach of a manager which makes it complex or simple. Here decision making plays important role.

Some more insights about decision making and problem solving coming up. So keep following!!