There is a misconception among many people – including many technical people – that technical people are not “creative.” This is not only wrong but detrimental because any problem-solving involves creativity. To the extent that technical problem solvers buy into the idea that they are not (cannot be) creative, they …

“The righter you do the wrong thing, the wronger you get.” Russell Ackoff In an interview with Phyllis Haynes on the Studio 1 Network, Russell Ackoff, Professor Emeritus in Management Science from the Wharton School, discussed one of the central problems in problem solving: addressing the right problem. This issue …

Einstein once observed, “If I had an hour to solve a problem I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.” In the world of problem solving it is hard to overstate the importance of understanding the problem to be solved. Our natural tendency is …

Structure Remember to treat writing as a system. Make your logical argument flow, building words into sentences, sentences into paragraphs, paragraphs into sections, and sections into documents. Vary your constructions – they mark out the cadence of your writing. You can use cadence to convey your message. For example, a …