Harnessing the Power of Creativity to Improve your Problem Solving Skills: Technique 4 (Using Alternative Data Sources and Measuring Tools)

Note: This article is about using creativity to improve your problem solving skills, and approximately a 20 minute read. This is the fourth article in a series in which I teach you useful creative techniques to help you in your problem solving skills. It is a bit abstract, and involves higher level thinking, so it may not be for you. So to be upfront, here are the bullet points for it. If you want to skip my introductory “fluff” and get right to the creative technique I will talk about in this article, feel free to skip to the subheading “Creative Technique #4: Using Alternative Data Sources and Measuring Tools”.

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Bullet Points

• The world is incredibly complex, large, and dynamic—it is constantly evolving, transforming, and shifting beyond anyone’s total control.

• We can’t comprehend everything that is going on by ourselves, so we have to rely on information aids to efficiently understand and make sense of the world. These “information aids” include tools, equipment, mediums, data sources, stories, myths, beliefs, and all kinds of valuation, measuring, and judgment systems.

• However, we need to be periodically critical of the information we’re getting, because poor data about something results in poor understanding. If the information you’re getting about something is limited or misleading or faulty, it can make a problem appear more difficult to solve, and limit your problem solving. It helps being open to alternative tools and equipment to interpret problems, because they can help in seeing problems in different ways, and comping up with new solutions for them.

• This creative technique encourages you to be aware of how you’re getting your information regarding a problem, and to seek out alternative and contradictory data sources to help change your interpretation of it.

• The key point with this creative technique is to be aware and critical of the types of mediums and data sources you’re getting to gather information and interpret a problem.

• When you’re seeking alternative information for a problem, do your best in identifying high-quality, truthful, honest data sources that are as contradictory as possible to your first, original, or primary data source. If you can’t find high-quality alternative data sources, just go with whatever contradictory data sources you can find. Even if they’re a bit faulty, they can help you with brainstorming new solutions for your problem.

The way we see many things in life is rooted in how we’re getting our information

A popular film genre throughout the world is of science fiction. Science fiction films often tend to portray stories about the future, regarding technological or scientific change, as well as asking what it means to be human in light of these changes.

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An often used story plot in science fiction stories is of a protagonist going through life, thinking that life is a certain way, only to be shown that in fact, the information he’s held about his life is wrong. In many science fiction stories, the protagonist finds out that s/he’s living in a matrix or fantasy or a “false” reality. The information s/he long held as unassailable about the way the world works in facts, turns out to be anything but, and his/her life in undergoes a transformation of some sort.

This is the stuff of movie plots and amusing stories about the future, but the point of them is to encourage us to ask ourselves the same thing. What kind of information are we getting about the world, and is it true? Are we truly looking at things in an honest, truthful way? In fact, how critical are we of the information we’re getting in regards to the way we perceive the world, and it’s various events and phenomena?

A good way to understand how you go through life is that it’s like a sort of state of mind. Your brain interprets chemical signals and synapses, which help you interpret what’s going on. This might sound kind of wacky, but a big requirement for getting on through life is to get comfortable and complacent with the kind of information you’re getting about the world. This falls apart whenever you have to deal with a difficult problem for which your framework about the world doesn’t apply to. In fact, that’s exactly what causes people to finally check their assumptions and be critical of their long-held assumptions and data sources on things--when they can no longer proceed and go forward in life with their current view of the world.

The world is too complicated to understand without the use of informational aids

The world is dynamic, complicated, and unfathomably large. We can’t comprehend every little thing that is going on.

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Our mental processing power is limited, and we can only focus on a few things at any given time. Trying to process everything on our own is incredibly taxing, and we wouldn’t be able to take care of our basic needs if we spent too much time trying to understand it all. For this reason, we need informational aids, heuristics, and tools to quickly make sense of the world. We need things such as newspapers, podcasts, food labels, cameras, rulers, but we also need abstract tools such as the metric system, the DSM-V, and the scientific method. Information aids and mediums and tools help us speed up our problem solving capabilities. They help us more efficiently understand, process, and engage with the changing world.

We need to be careful of believing in faulty or misleading information

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With poor information, comes a poor understanding of what’s going on in the world. It’s important to be objective and critical regarding where you’re getting your information from about something, as well as the kinds of tools or mediums you’re using to measure or judge a situation. Different tools and mediums can give us different ways to interpret things, and it’s important to not become too overly reliant on just one of them. There are so many different ways to look at something, and it’s important to be aware that some things are so complex as to be difficult to distill through just one prism. Which is to say, arriving at the “truth” of something often requires being inclusive of information from different sources.

Creative Technique #4: Using Alternative Data Sources and Measuring Tools

This creative technique is about being aware of how you’re getting information about a problem, and being willing to consider alternative tools or data sources to understand it. We enlist the aid of informational tools and mediums in order to efficiently make sense out of a situation, but sometimes the data we’re getting is misleading, skewed, false, or unknowingly limiting. Some problems are so multifaceted and complex that they can only be understood via gathering information from different sources. Even if you are getting high quality information on a problem, it is beneficial to seek out alternative data sources for understanding it. Varied information regarding a problem makes it easier to brainstorm multiple solutions for solving it.

Sample Problem

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A sample problem to better understand this creative technique is to consider the problem of communication with someone who is deaf. Let’s say you’re trying to communicate to someone you work with frequently, who is deaf. However, you don’t know any sign language, and you’d like to move on past basic pointing and hand signals. You’re not quite sure what approach to take to better communicate with this person, and you don’t want to inadvertently offend them. You need to be able to communicate in a more complicated way than basic hand signals. How should you approach the problem?

Technique Breakdown

This creative technique encourages you to examine how your getting your information, and the tools you’re using, to interpret and make sense of a problem. You want to be sure that the data you’re getting is as objective and truthful as possible, and if it isn’t, you should seek out data that is. Even if you are getting good information about an issue, you could be limiting your problem solving mental muscle if you don’t look at other types of information. First, you want to make sure that the quality of your information is top-notch by being critical towards it. Then, you’re going to seek out other information that is high-quality, and comes from a supported, proven origin—if you can’t do that, try to find the most legitimate alternative data source you can find for your problem. Thirdly, seek alternative tools, measuring equipment, or mediums very distinct than the ones you’re currently using—look into tools used in very distinct fields than your problem. The underlying premise behind this creative technique is that the more diverse data you have in regards to a problem, the more likely you’ll be able to brainstorm solutions for it.

Step by Step Approach

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1. Take Inventory: In the first step, take an inventory of your data sources, information, and tools you’re using to “judge”, “measure”, and “make sense” of a problem. How did you get this information? Did you get it from an external source or yourself? Were any tools or equipment used to interpret your problem?

2. Be Critical: In this second step, be critical and judgmental and analyze the quality of the data sources and tools you’re using to interpret your problem. How truthful and honest and objective is the source of the data you’re getting? Are the tools you’re using to measure and judge your problem adequate for measuring it? What kinds of assumptions are inherent in your data? Is your information objective, high-quality, or strongly supported or reasoned? Is the data you’re getting making a lot of assumptions somewhere? What are the limitations of the measuring equipment and tools you’re using to understand your problem?

3. Seek Alternative Information: In this third step, you contemplate and seek out different sources for information regarding your problem that are high quality, but as contradictory as possible. Look for different kinds of tools and equipment you can use to measure and judge your problem--perhaps they belong to a different measuring system, or they’re more or less complex, or they’re from totally different fields. The goal is to look for highly distinct and contradictory ways to measure and interpret your problem. Is there a data source out there that is saying something totally different about your problem? Does a different methodology exist for measuring your problem? Is there a different kind of tool you can use to interpret your problem? If you’re using abstract tools, could you use different abstract tools? If you’re using physical tools, could you use different physical tools? Could you use abstract tools in lieu of physical tools, or vice versa? Is there be a better methodology or process for interpreting your data?

The important thing to understand is that no fault-free, 100% accurate, “perfect” source for information exists to understand everything. To obtain a better understanding about a situation, judges, managers, and leaders become receptive to information from different sources. This is because there isn’t one way to understand everything. Often, data sources and tools that are good at understanding certain things fail remarkably at others. For this reason we need to be critical of the information we’re getting.

The Key Point

The key point with this creative technique is in being aware and critical of the information you’re getting about a problem. A great way to be more creative in your problem solving is to be willing to consume alternative and contradictory information.

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Ideally, you would seek out alternative data sources that are high-quality, truthful, and objective, that would paint your problem in a very different way. Even if you are unable to determine alternative sources of information that are just as high-quality, seeking different and distinct mediums can be incredibly useful for your brainstorming efforts. Utilize very distinct measuring tools (abstract or tangible ones) for helping you understand and approach your problem from a different angle. Above all, take a chance on new data sources to interpret your problem, even if they end up being faulty or misleading—at the very least, they will stimulate your problem solving.

Return to Problem

Now, let’s apply our step by step methodology for applying the creative technique of using new tools and information to our sample problem. Our sample problem was about figuring out a way to better communicate with someone you work with frequently who is deaf. Let’s go through each step for this problem.

1. The first step is about becoming aware of the type of information you’re getting (or have) about the problem. First of all, how did you find out that specific person was deaf? How are you getting your information regarding how deaf people behave, and want to be treated? Did you read about them, or be told about them, or have you ever previously known someone who was deaf? Did you watch a documentary, or try to talk to someone who is deaf before, or were instructed by someone to see them in a certain way? This first step is about taking inventory of the information you’ve got about deaf people.

2. The second step is to be critical and analyze the quality of the tools and data sources you’re using to interpret your problem. Is it true that that specific person you work with is deaf? Are you getting good and truthful information about how deaf people are? What was the quality of the source regarding the stuff you read about them, or were told about them? Did you watch an objective documentary about them, or was the person who told you to interact with deaf people giving you the right information? Are there any biases or conflicts of interest in the data sources that informed you about interacting with deaf people? Are the “tools” of judging and learning about deaf people, such as the television channels, and online articles you read about them, advancing a certain agenda?

3. The third step is in contemplating new alternative data sources and mediums for measuring your problem than the ones you’re currently using right now. Ideally, you’d look for alternative, high-quality data sources and very different measuring tools. Well, an alternative medium of information for this specific problem could be ASKING THE PERSON themselves how they would like to be communicated with. Instead of hand signals that you’re currently using, perhaps you could communicate with them via messaging applications or maybe you could actually learn sign language if they speak it. Maybe you can find someone else that can interpret for you two, or hire an interpreter from somewhere? Perhaps you can just go forth and try to speak to this person and see how they respond?

Through this creative technique we became proactive and contemplated different data sources and mediums from which to gather information on the issue to help us in our problem solving. The main hindrance for our sample problem was past assumptions we had about deaf people. The information we were holding onto made the problem harder to solve because it was turning it into a taboo. To get past it, we had to temporarily suspend our prior information about the problem being taboo. Given that our problem had to do with a certain person, we found that the main alternative data source to break the taboo was to ask the person themselves.

Summary

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We interpret the world based on the measuring tools we’re using and the type of information we have. We need these aids to efficiently understand the complexity of the world, since we can’t process every single bit of information that comes at us. So, tools exist to aid us in comprehending the world and interpreting things, but they can hurt by making us see things in a limited way. If we find ourselves needing to assault a problem from a different direction, we should consider consulting alternative measuring tools and informational mediums.