What's Your Problem?


Book Description

"The author makes a compelling case that we often start solving a problem before thinking deeply about whether we are solving the right problem. If you want the superpower of solving better problems, read this book." -- Eric Schmidt, former CEO, Google Are you solving the right problems? Have you or your colleagues ever worked hard on something, only to find out you were focusing on the wrong problem entirely? Most people have. In a survey, 85 percent of companies said they often struggle to solve the right problems. The consequences are severe: Leaders fight the wrong strategic battles. Teams spend their energy on low-impact work. Startups build products that nobody wants. Organizations implement "solutions" that somehow make things worse, not better. Everywhere you look, the waste is staggering. As Peter Drucker pointed out, there's nothing more dangerous than the right answer to the wrong question. There is a way to do better. The key is reframing, a crucial, underutilized skill that you can master with the help of this book. Using real-world stories and unforgettable examples like "the slow elevator problem," author Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg offers a simple, three-step method - Frame, Reframe, Move Forward - that anyone can use to start solving the right problems. Reframing is not difficult to learn. It can be used on everyday challenges and on the biggest, trickiest problems you face. In this visually engaging, deeply researched book, you’ll learn from leaders at large companies, from entrepreneurs, consultants, nonprofit leaders, and many other breakthrough thinkers. It's time for everyone to stop barking up the wrong trees. Teach yourself and your team to reframe, and growth and success will follow.




Problem-Solving Through Problems


Book Description

This is a practical anthology of some of the best elementary problems in different branches of mathematics. Arranged by subject, the problems highlight the most common problem-solving techniques encountered in undergraduate mathematics. This book teaches the important principles and broad strategies for coping with the experience of solving problems. It has been found very helpful for students preparing for the Putnam exam.




Solving Impossible Problems


Book Description

Solving Impossible Problems will give you a greater understanding of organisational tensions and paradox. You will learn how to recognise these 'twisty turny' problems and then use practical tools to resolve them or use them for innovation.




How to Solve Impossible Problems: A guide to the thinking tools of CEOs, philosophers, inventors, and billionaires


Book Description

No matter your field of expertise, every day you’re presented with seemingly impossible challenges. Issues that you or your company can’t seem to crack, even after weeks, months, or years of trying. How do you approach these impossible challenges? Do you have a strategy that you follow, or do you just hold a brainstorming session and hope for the best? Do you tell yourself, “Think harder!” and pray inspiration will strike? There’s a better way to solve problems like these — improve the quality of your thinking. Better thinking, problem-solving, and reasoning are skills. They can be developed through self-examination, learning new frameworks, and expanding our mental models. Lucky for us, brilliant thinkers, creators, entrepreneurs, and philosophers — people like Elon Musk, Aristotle, Charlie Munger, Issac Newton, Ada Lovelace, Albert Einstein, Frederick Douglass, Maya Angelou, and Henry Ford — have left behind documentation, frameworks, and tools for considering impossible problems. In "How to Solve Impossible Problems," author Jennifer L. Clinehens (Choice Hacking, CX That Sings) presents 7 such tools to improve our thinking and help us solve what feel like insurmountable challenges. In each chapter she gives specific, actionable advice, real-world examples, and in a free companion course (available February 15, 2022) provides worksheets to help apply each principle.




How to Solve Impossible Problems


Book Description

No matter your field of expertise, every day you're presented with seemingly impossible challenges. Issues that you or your company can't seem to crack, even after weeks, months, or years of trying. How do you approach these impossible challenges? Do you have a strategy that you follow, or do you just hold a brainstorming session and hope for the best? Do you tell yourself, "Think harder!" and pray inspiration will strike? There's a better way to solve problems like these - improve the quality of your thinking. Better thinking, problem-solving, and reasoning are skills. They can be developed through self-examination, learning new frameworks, and expanding our mental models. Lucky for us, brilliant thinkers, creators, entrepreneurs, and philosophers - people like Elon Musk, Aristotle, Charlie Munger, Issac Newton, Ada Lovelace, Albert Einstein, Frederick Douglass, Maya Angelou, and Henry Ford - have left behind documentation, frameworks, and tools for considering impossible problems. In "How to Solve Impossible Problems," author Jennifer L. Clinehens (Choice Hacking, CX That Sings) presents 7 such tools to improve our thinking and help us solve what feel like insurmountable challenges. In each chapter she gives specific, actionable advice, real-world examples, and in a free companion course (available February 21, 2022) provides worksheets to help apply each principle.




Stop Guessing


Book Description

Illustrated with examples ranging from everyday issues to serious problems, this book will help you understand the behaviors that great problem-solvers use to tackle the hardest problems with skill and panache, regardless of the industry or nature of the problem. --




Wicked Problems Worth Solving


Book Description

It feels like our world is spinning out of control. We see poverty, disease, and destruction all around us, and as we search for ways to make sense of the chaos, we're turning to new disciplines for answers and solutions. New, creative innovations are needed, and these new approaches demand different methods and different theories. This book is presented as a handbook for teaching and learning how to design for impact. In it, you'll learn how to apply the process of design to large, wicked problems, and how to gain control over complexity by acting as a social entrepreneur. You'll learn an argument for why design is a powerful agent of change, and you'll read practical methods for engaging with large-scale social problems. You can read this entire book online for free at http://www.wickedproblems.com/




How to Solve it


Book Description

"Polya reveals how the mathematical method of demonstrating a proof or finding an unknown can be of help in attacking any problem that can be "reasoned" out--from building a bridge to winning a game of anagrams."--Back cover.




A Mind for Numbers


Book Description

Engineering professor Barbara Oakley knows firsthand how it feels to struggle with math. In her book, she offers you the tools needed to get a better grasp of that intimidating but inescapable field.




The Ultimate Challenge


Book Description

The $3x+1$ problem, or Collatz problem, concerns the following seemingly innocent arithmetic procedure applied to integers: If an integer $x$ is odd then “multiply by three and add one”, while if it is even then “divide by two”. The $3x+1$ problem asks whether, starting from any positive integer, repeating this procedure over and over will eventually reach the number 1. Despite its simple appearance, this problem is unsolved. Generalizations of the problem are known to be undecidable, and the problem itself is believed to be extraordinarily difficult. This book reports on what is known on this problem. It consists of a collection of papers, which can be read independently of each other. The book begins with two introductory papers, one giving an overview and current status, and the second giving history and basic results on the problem. These are followed by three survey papers on the problem, relating it to number theory and dynamical systems, to Markov chains and ergodic theory, and to logic and the theory of computation. The next paper presents results on probabilistic models for behavior of the iteration. This is followed by a paper giving the latest computational results on the problem, which verify its truth for $x < 5.4 cdot 10^{18}$. The book also reprints six early papers on the problem and related questions, by L. Collatz, J. H. Conway, H. S. M. Coxeter, C. J. Everett, and R. K. Guy, each with editorial commentary. The book concludes with an annotated bibliography of work on the problem up to the year 2000.