Problem Solving

Problems are always attached within our lives wheter are you student, employee, or even a UN’s secretary general. We all have problems wheter big or small. What differentiated one from another is how they face problems.

Rule number one is the attitude. Perhaps you have mastered the problem-solving tools. But problem solving is not just skills, it is a whole mind-set.  A true problem solver is constantly trying to bring out the best in them to shape their environment, their world.

According to Ken Watanabe – A former Mckinsey & Company management consultant – there are four types of attitude which can get in the way of effective problem solving.  Maybe these attitudes remind you of someone, or remind you of yourself. Now let us identify some:

• Miss Sigh

She is a kind of person who gives up immediately whenever she faces a smallest challenge. Sometimes Miss Sigh had a great idea to fix a problem. But she is afraid to speak it up. Afraid people will laugh at her.  Mrs Sigh can’t take control of her life. She just sighs.

• Mr Critic

Mr Critic is never afraid to speak up. Whenever someone comes up with the plan, he is ready to point out the weakneses and attack everybody else’s ideas. He is always eager to blame someonle else whenever things go wrong. Similar with Miss Sigh, Mr Critic never gets anything done. Maybe he is too afraid to take responsibillites and face the fact that he himself makes mistakes.

• Miss Dreamer

Miss Dreamer has her head stuck in the clouds. She has great ideas, but she never goes beyond that. Miss Dreamer is never bothered maps out her dreams into set of action. She is statisfied with thinking about her dreams.

• Mr. Go-Getter

Different from others, Mr.Go-Getter seems like a non-problem solver. He is proactive and doesn’t have problems with negative thoughts. He quickly jumps into action when anything goes wrong. However, he is kind of someone who doesn’t know how to pause and think before act. He tends to blame every failure on lack of effort. He is not interested in finding the root-cause of the problem. All he wants to do is trying harder and harder. He failed to realize that stopping to think might as important as taking action.

What kind of attitude does problem-solver have? Like Mr.Go-Getter, problem solver doesn’t hesitate to take action, but the difference is they know when to step on the brake and change the direction. They identify root cause of the problems and setting a specific goal. While taking action they are also monitoring their progress to make sure they are heading to the right direction.

Rule number two is the steps. Problem solving is not magic. Problems will not dissapear with a single wave of hands or with an uttering of incantation. It requires several steps to be done, and every step is important. Those steps are; (1) understand the current situation, (2) identify the root cause of the problem, (3) develop an action plan, (4) execute until the problem is solved and making modifications if needed.

At the very beginning, before you solve anything, you have to realize there is a problem. Afterwards, you have to find the root-cause. Yet, finding the root-cause of the problem is not enough, you have to think how to fix your problem and take the action.

Although it sounds very easy and simple, the practice is not easy and sometimes it gets tricky. Along the way, there are obstacles, a true problem solver are persistent to the goal and always open to changes and modifications as necessary.

I would give you the example taken from Watanabe’s Problem Solving 101 book.

Consider a student whose math grades are going down. Like any normal students, the student would have to raise his grades. Maybe, without finding what actually the root-cause of the problem, He made a decision to quit soccer team and focus studying. This extreme decision would be such a waste if the main problem is not how long he studies, but how effective.

A problem solvng kid might start by asking himself, “What type of question am I getting wrong?” Then he breaks down the question into categories like, algebra, fraction, and geometry. By comparing the scores between categories he might find that the algebra score is going up, fraction is flat and only geometry is going down. Just looking at the average math grades, doesn’t help him to see the exact problems.

If geometry is the problem, then he must further break down geometry scores into subtopics including area, angles, and volume to better identify the problem.

When his understanding goes from level “my math grades are going down” to more specific “my math grades are going down because I’m not doing well in three topic: trapezoid area, cylinder volume and pyhtaogorean theorm application” the effectiveness of his plan and the end result would be significantly different.

After He identifes what problems that cause him troubles, then he can make an action plan. Wheter it is to increase study time or to improve his method. Increase study time means adding extra study time before sleep or after waking up. Improve his method can be done by swithcing to a better textbook, ask teacher and friends, or hire a tutor.

The effective way to solve math problems is different for everybody. That is why you should asking the “why” and “how” question to develop a custom-made action plan. As you can see, problem solving is not complicated, even if it is big and complicated. You just have to break it down into small manageable problems, and you will be able to solve it.

Rule number three is the tools. Tools are important. But you only can use the tool after you have the attitude and understand the steps. Problem solving tools which will I describe below are simple common tools used for problem solving. Not limited only to these tools, perhaps there are other thousands of toolsl which can be used for problem solving activites. Anything which help you understand the situtation, map your idea, or simply give you better visualisation, can be considered as a tool.

• Logic tree

Logic tree is a simple yet versatile visual tool. You probably have been using it to describe ideas. In problem solving, logic tree can help you to identify root cause of the problems and develop solutions. The key point of using logic tree is to break down problems into categories without anything left out. Here’s the example

• Yes/no tree

Ye s or no tree can be used to figured out a problem or developing  solutions by posing mulitple yes/no questions. I give you a funny example. Ignore the harsh words though

• Problem solving desgin plan

Problem solving design plan is designed to collecting and analysing data to support your hypothesis. In the desgin plan you clarify the issue you are going to solve, state your hypothesis and reasons, list the analysis, actions and information to prove or disaprove your hypothesis. It doesn’t have to be above mentioned, you can make your own design plan correspond to current situation. I’ll give you the example taken from Watanabe’s book. It’s about a band called The Mushroom Lovers. After their first three concerts, they had only 15 peoples. After made hypothesis, they are trying to collect information to prove and dissaprove their hypothesis. They need a design plan to avoid collect irrelevant information. Their design plan as follow;

Issue	Hypothesis	Rationale	Analysis	Information
Why are some pople who know about the concerts not coming?	Because they don’t like rock music in general	What music lover wouldn’t go to a free show	Interview 5 people who knew about the concerts but didn’t attend	Interview

• Hypothesis pyramid

Hypothesis pyramid is a great tool to structuring your argument. It can be used to clarify your conclusion and useful for communicating your arguments to others. The basic structure puts the conclusion on top while supporting arguments on the bottom, like structure of pyramids.

• Pros and Cons; Criteria and evaluation

When you need to evaluate multiple options and select the best, you can use Pros and Cons table. It really helps you before you make any decisions. It ensures you to consider the good and bad aspects. You also can use criteria and evaluation tool to make decision. By criteria, you can evaluate your options and decide the importance of each criterias. These examples are also taken from Watanabe’s book.

Pro con’s table

	Pro’s	Con’s
Amadillo high school	+++ High quality of education ++ strong baseball team ++ free tuition ++ some of friends will probably go there	– – – No study abroad program –far from home –old school building
	Total 10 +	Total 5 -
Beaver high school	+++ High quality of education +++ strong baseball team +++ study abroad program +++ free tuition ++ many of friends will probably go there	–far from home –old school builiding
	Total 14 +	Total 2 -

Criteria & evaluation table

Criteria	Importance	Amadillo HS	Beaver HS
Quality of education	high	+++	+++
Study abroad program	High	+ (no)	+++
Strenght of baseball team	Medium	++	++
Cost of tuition	high	+++ (free)	+++(free)

We can see that to solve a problem is not hard. Like riding bicylce, swimming, and any other stuff, it needs practice. Once you are used to, You can stop panicking, get a grip, and start thinking.  Problem solving is easy when you know how to set a clear goal, figure out how to reach it, and follow through while reviewing progress and making changes to your plan as necessary

We also have to change our perspective to a problem. Rather seeing it as a problems, we could view it as a challange. A chance to make ourselves, our community or even the world better.

*Most of it are taken from Ken Watanabe’s book: Problem Solving 101. It is actually a book for children to face new problem-solving focused education. But somehow, with simple language, real-life examples and attractive pictures, a complicated matters become easy and manageable.

Kebahagiaan dan Absurditas

Beberapa hari lalu Saya membaca email yang dikirim oleh seorang kawan. Kurang lebih pesannya seperti ini;  seringkali kita berlari dan berlari tanpa mengatahui tujuan kita, dan ketika kita telah sampai diakhir ternyata kita sadar bukan hal itu yang kita cari selama ini. Kemudian, penulis mencoba menghubungkan kebahagiaan dengan mengerjakan hal-hal yang disukai. Terdengar indah dan menginspirasi memang, tapi sekaligus absurd. Di dunia yang selamanya tidak bisa ditebak dan chaotic, manusia mencoba mencari makna, mencari tujuan.  Seperti mencoba mendapatkan makna dari sesuatu yang sebetulnya tidak jelas, absurd.

Memiliki tujuan hidup memang membuat kita memiliki semangat ditengah ketidakpastian.  Saya berani bertaruh, hampir semua orang waras di dunia ini memiliki tujuan dalam hidupnya, entah itu sekedar untuk makan atau untuk menjadi sukses dan terkenal. Saya pun memiliki tujuan hidup, walaupun kemudian Saya sering mempertanyakan kembali tujuan hidup Saya.

Selama ini, Saya beranggapan bahwa mimpi-mimpi adalah tujuan hidup. Karir cemerlang dan hidup serba kecukupan adalah tujuan  Tapi kemudian  Saya pun menjadi ragu dan kembali mempertanyakan, karena pada akhirnya Saya pun akan terbentur tembok kenyataan. Karir tidak akan pernah selesai didaki, harta tidak akan habis dicari. Sejujurnya, Saya masih ragu dengan apa yang sebetulnya dicari.  Saya kerap mempertanyakan, mungkin dengan mempertanyakan apa yang sebetulnya dicari  semakin dekat atau bisa jadi akan semakin menjauh. Dan Saya pun terjebak dalam absurditas.

Apakah yang Saya cari itu kebahagiaan?

Di email itu, penulis mencoba menghubungkan kebahagiaan dengan melakukan hal-hal yang disukai. Katanya “Kebahagiaan dalam hidup ini akan dapat Anda raih bila Anda melakukan sesuatu yang benar-benar Anda nikmati”. Sepintas memang terdengar menginspirasi. Tapi, pada kenyataannya dunia tidak dapat ditebak, kebahagiaan tidak sesederhana itu, dan hal-hal yang benar-benar kita nikmati belum tentu menjamin kebahagiaan.  Seberapa keraspuun berusaha, pada akhirnya manusia dipaksa tunduk oleh sesuatu diluar kemampuan nalarnya, sesuatu yang mungkin kita namakan takdir atau kehendak Tuhan. Manusia selamanya hidup dalam absurditas.

Albert Camus,  dalam essai Le mhyte de sisyphe, menggambarkan ketidakberdayaan manusia terhadap sesuatu diluar nalar.  Sisyphus, sesorang yang dikutuk Dewa, selamanya hanya mendorong batu besar ke atas gunung hanya untuk melihatnya menggelinding ke bawah dan mendorongnya kembali. Pekerjaan yang sia-sia itu merupakan metafor dari kehidupan modern yang sehari-hari berjibaku dengan hal yang sama, berulang-ulang, absurd.

Pada akhirnya, pencarian kebahagian akan sampai pada kehampaan dan kesia-siaan. Mencoba menjelaskan tentang dunia dan kontradiksinya hanya akan membuat kebahagiaan semakin menjauh. Mungkin karena itulah Eleanor Roosevelt  percaya happiness is not a goal, it is a byproduct. Memang, orang-orang hebat di dunia yang menginspirasi adalah orang-orang yang tidak terobsesi dengan kebahagiaan itu sendiri,  melainkan mereka yang berani berjuang, melakukan perubahan dan bergulat dengan kehidupan. Bukan orang-orang yang terobsesi mengejar kebahagiaan.

Lucu memang ketika kita terobsesi mempelajari dan mengejar  kebahagiaan, semakin tidak bahagia kita dibuatnya, semakin membingungkan dan semakin absurd.

A Girl Who Silenced the World for five Minutes

It was 17 years ago. This 12 years old  girl , Severn Suzuki, made a stunning speech at Earth Summit which attended by environmental ministers from all over the world  in Rio de Janiero, Brazil. She spoke for ECO – The Environmental Children’s Organization – a group of twelve and thirteen years old.

Amazing, while i was playing soccer and getting addicted to TV shows, this girl kicked some ass at the Summit. Even after 17 years, this speech is still relevant with environmental problems nowadays. She was able to increase global awareness about such problems.  So, here is the excerpt and the video:

“Hello, I’m Severn Suzuki speaking for E.C.O. – The Environmental Children’s Organisation. We are a group of twelve and thirteen-year-olds from Canada trying to make a difference: Vanessa Suttie, Morgan Geisler, Michelle Quigg and me. We raised all the money ourselves to come five thousand miles to tell you adults you must change your ways. Coming here today, I have no hidden agenda. I am fighting for my future. Losing my future is not like losing an election or a few points on the stock market. I am here to speak for all generations to come.

I am here to speak on behalf of the starving children around the world whose cries go unheard.

I am here to speak for the countless animals dying across this planet because they have nowhere left to go. We cannot afford to be not heard.

I am afraid to go out in the sun now because of the holes in the ozone. I am afraid to breathe the air because I don’t know what chemicals are in it.

I used to go fishing in Vancouver with my dad until just a few years ago we found the fish full of cancers. And now we hear about animals and plants going extinct every day vanishing forever.

In my life, I have dreamt of seeing the great herds of wild animals, jungles and rainforests full of birds and butterflies, but now I wonder if they will even exist for my children to see.

Did you have to worry about these little things when you were my age?

All this is happening before our eyes and yet we act as if we have all the time we want and all the solutions. I’m only a child and I don’t have all the solutions, but I want you to realise, neither do you! You don’t know how to fix the holes in our ozone layer. You don’t know how to bring salmon back up a dead stream. You don’t know how to bring back an animal now extinct. And you can’t bring back forests that once grew where there is now desert. If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it!

At school, even in kindergarten, you teach us to behave in the world. You teach us: not to fight with others, to work things out, to respect others, to clean up our mess, not to hurt other creatures, to share – not be greedy.

Then why do you go out and do the things you tell us not to do?

Do not forget why you’re attending these conferences, who you’re doing this for “” we are your own children. You are deciding what kind of world we will grow up in. Parents should be able to comfort their children by saying “everything going to be alright” , “we’re doing the best we can” and “it’s not the end of the world”.

But I don’t think you can say that to us anymore. Are we even on your list of priorities? My father always says “You are what you do, not what you say.”

Well, what you do makes me cry at night. You grown ups say you love us. I challenge you, please make your actions reflect your words. Thank you.

Seventeen years has passed and Suzuki speech is still relevant with current situation. Now i’m working for fertilizer company, environmental section. Everyday, I have been trying to raise environment awareness. Then I realized that I am lagging in term of environmental protection. I’m left behind. When everyone is making an action plan, I’m still raising awareness. Raising awareness is easy, because everyone wants to be involved in “green movement”.

Now, green has become new kind of lifestyle.  Here and there we can see “green” movement, but somehow along the way the major purpose has gotten lost. Green movement is not about music concerts, is not about gaining political influence, is not about marketing strategy. Green has became a license to feel good without doing something good, as Thomas Friedman a NY Times columnist said. Green movement is about how we respond to a great challenge to preserve our natural world. It is a survival strategy. And to face it, we have to stop doing easy thing like organizing “go green” music concert and choose the road less-traveled.

We should be ashamed. Seventen years ago, a twelve years old girl did something. She raised money and gave a speech in front of policy makers. Now, the best thing we can do is running “go green” music concert. I’m sure that everybody knows the “1000 ways to save the earth”, but when it comes to real action, rarely we see a hero. Suzuki speech has become a reminder of what green movement is all about “You are what you do, not what you say.”

Sepedaan Lagi

Setelah 2 minggu berturut-turut lembur (termasuk weekend) Saya merencanakan akhir minggu yang berbeda. Biasanya, akhir minggu diisi dengan bangun siang, bermalas-malasan dan nonton DVD. Minggu ini, Saya mau bersepeda keliling Bontang.

Jam setengah tujuh pagi, Denny – kawan Saya-  datang menjemput. Awalnya, Saya kira kami akan bersepeda beramai-ramai. Tapi ternyata hanya Saya dan Denny saja. Kami berencana akan pergi ke Tanjung Laut. Cukup jauh.

Setelah cukup lama tidak bersepeda, perjalanan kali ini lumayan melelahkan. Kami berencana mengambil rute dengan melewati kawasan HOP Badak-Gunung Sahari-Tanjung Laut kemudian kembali.

Kami sempat singgah sebentar di pelabuhan Tanjung Laut untuk melihat hiruk-pikuk pelabuhan. Pelabuhan Tanjung Laut cukup sepi. Hanya ada beberapa kapal yang bersandar, tidak ada aktifitas bongkar muat,  padahal hari masih pagi.  Kemudian kami melanjutkan ke arah Tanjung Laut sampai jalan aspalnya habis. Setelah mentok kami berbalik ke arah Berbas.

Kami memutuskan untuk melewati kompleks PT. Badak untuk jalur pulang. Kompleks PT. Badak yang memiliki airport didalamnya adalah kompleks yang luas, hijau dan tertata dengan baik. Secara kasar, kompleks perusahaan PT. Badak lebih besar dari PT. Pupuk Kaltim. Selain airport, kompleks PT. Badak memilki town hall, area hutan wisata, fasilitas lapangan sepakbola, kolam renang, dan tempat nursery tanaman. Tanpa bermaksud membandingkan, PT. Pupuk Kaltim juga memiliki fasilitas-fasilitas tersebut, namun karena penempatannya yang tersebar fasilitas-fasilitas tersebut relatif kurang terekspos.

Saya paling senang melihat kawasan hijau PT. Badak karena sangat luas, pohonnya besar-besar dan formasi pohohnnya rapat. Namun, kawasan PT. Badak relatif sepi. Jarang sekali terlihat orang lewat, bahkan sekedar untuk berolahraga. Area hutan wisata yang harusnya ramai saat akhir minggu terlihat sangat sepi. Bandingkan dengan danau PCVI PT. Pupuk Kaltim yang ramai dikunjungi saat akhir pekan.  Menurut desas-desus yang beredar,  dahulu kawasan PT. Badak sangat tertutup kepada orang luar. Hanya beberapa tahun terakhir saja PT. Badak sedikit terbuka, itupun karena dikritik.

Sepeda si Denny

Hal yang menarik dari PT. Badak adalah upaya promosi masalah Health, Safety & Environment. PT. Badak nampak amat serius dengan penerapan budaya keselamatan kerja dan lingkungan hidup. Saya melihat banyak banner di ruang-ruang publik mengenai pennghargaan yang diraih PT. Badak. Selain itu, banyak banner yang mempromosikan keselamatan kerja dengan kreatif. Saya melihat ini sebagai hal yang positif, karena banner tersebut menunjukan upaya PT. Badak mempromosikan budaya HSE yang baik.

Sebelum pulang, kami memutuskan singgah untuk sarapan di warung Sari Rasa langganan Saya. Saya sengaja makan sedikit saja untuk mengurangi gejolak di perut nanti saat bersepeda karena perjalanan masih cukup jauh.

Setelah bersepeda badan terasa segar! Ah, minggu yang menyenangkan. Saya bukan hanya menikmati sepedaan kali ini, Saya juga membutuhkannya. Minggu depan adalah minggu yang berat karena pada tanggal 20 Oktober 2009 Pupuk Kaltim akan menjalani audit lingkungan oleh tim PROPER Provinsi. Jauh-jauh sebelumnya atasan Saya sudah berpesan untuk mempersiapkannya dengan baik. Sebetulnya Saya sudah cukup sering mengikuti audit PROPER, namun baru kali ini Saya harus menyiapkan dan menghadapi PROPER tanpa bantuan rekan Saya yang sedang dinas ke Taipei. Maka dari itu, Saya membutuhkan penyegaran sebelum menjalaninya. Mudah-mudahan dengan bersepeda, Saya siap menjalani minggu depan yang cukup berat.

Claiming on Divine Truth

After ten days of lazying and spending both in Jakarta and Bandung, finally I come back to the real world. First day of work was full of surprise. First, I got the information that our Company got unexpected result concerning environmental audit conducted by ministry of Environment Republic of Indonesia. The second one, I got a disturbing article from my colleague. The article which sent to all members in my departement was pretentious and full of hatred.

I should be concerned with the first one, but the second issue really made me worried.

I will not tell the details about the article. The point is, the article really discredited particular religion. I’m worried and concerned, why after Idul fitri, in fully consciousness someone shared out this article through webmail. Fortunately, he didn’t send it to every departement in Pupuk Kaltim. He would embarrass himself if he did so.

***

I highly doubt the validity of this article. I doubt, in this era, there are people who are trying so hard to discredit other religion and  persuade others to embrace certain religion even with ways contrary to the spirit of religion itself. This contra-productive action is becoming irrational because (according to the article), involving big institutions, spending huge amount of resources, even doing things that opposite with the spirit of religion. In my opinion, religion should be the leader of social development, guarding values and maintain social stability, not annihilate it.

I was wondering why did my colleague share out the article? What was his motivation? Didn’t he know the article contain serious accusation? Didn’t he realize its impact to inter-religion relationship? Didn’t he have friends who are follower of certain religion?

I assumed my colleague wanted to reveal the weaknesses of other religion and yet showed that his religion was the undoubtedly divine truth. Well my friend, every religion has its own weaknesses. All religions were born in pre-modern age. No wonder, in modern sensitivity, religion has weaknesses. Atrocity, massacre, and bloodshed tinted the history of religion in pre-modern age. It is meaningless to point out the weaknesses of certain religion meanwhile trying to show that certain religion is better. Rather than seeking for weaknesses, religion should be working hand in hand for humanity. I believe in its particularity, every religion contain universal values like equality, compassion, humanity and justice which accepted throughout the world.

Speaking of divine truth, A divine truth could not be claimed by certain religion. I like the metaphor in tasawwuf that describes divine truth as a broken mirror which scattered all over, and each religion pick one piece of the broken mirror. To think that one piece is the whole mirror is equivalent to arrogance or takabbur. A firm and strong believe that the divine truth has already been grabbed would lead to authoritarianism.  In this problem, the sender believed that he has spoken the truth, and because it is the divine truth, everyone has to accept it, no room for critics, no space left for arguments.

Fortunately, the believers which relgion been discredited took it wisely. One of them responded on webmail “I urged that everyone in this departement would keep good work atmosphere, and maintain the relationship between employees remain strong without anyone being cornered, marginalized and condemned based on his/her religious belief”. I agree that no one have the right to judge anyone based on their religious belief.

***

One thing left in my mind. Why do religions especially the family of semitic religions (Jew, Christian, Islam) can’t stand of diversity? Although technically Jew, Christian and Islam worship the same God and hold universal humanity values, still violence was unavoidable in the history of these three religions. That is why in this modern world, there are many rational atheists who are disappointed with religion. They believe that all religions are evil and bad. They are disappointed with religion as Richard Dawkins said in The God Delusion “I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world..”

Well Mr. Dawkins, I’m not agree with you, but you are not entirely wrong. True, some religious sects are satisfied with the understanding of religion and world. They often said that the religion has to be purified from secular contamination and back to fundamental. Fundamentalism is against any interpretation of Scripture as if fundamentalism itself is not a form of interpretation. Religion has always been an interpretation of Scripture. We know God through Script and learn religion also through Script. The Interpreting Scripture is unavoidable yet imperfect.

When some religious sect claimed that its interpretation is perfect, there is no room left for arguments and critics. When there are no rooms for critics, actually they are playing God. In Indonesia, we often hear on ther news that some fierce religious group attacks another group because they have different interpretation. Rather than sit down and discuss it like civilized people, they choose to attack in large group in the name of God. When certain groups claimed their interpretation is perfect, they open a door to violence.

Fundamentalist forgets that the mortal human is imperfect. Interpretation of Script is  a human’s work. That is why the search for (red: interpretation) divine truth should never be stopped. Because once it stops, we open the door to new form of fascism in religion.

***

The lack of sensitivity and the enormous feeling of being right had blinded my colleague. He failed to sense the hatred contained in the article. He was too naïve who think that every article in the internet is valid without counter-checked it first. and the most important thing, he failed to put himself in other people’s shoes.

For me, at least I learned that divine truth is a never ending discourse. Talking about divine truth also means to wrestle with the limitation of language and limitation of human. With acceptance of limitiation at least we are being “humble” human with sense of imperfection.