I have often admired De Bono's work on lateral thinking and the books that have arisen from that. It takes talent to be able to recognize what people need to do when they are stuck with a problem and only look at a singular solution instead of seeing alternate approaches. It is the alternate approach that could be better than expecting a more common solution and De Bono likened this to seeing the problem from different perspectives, instead from the classic front one. He would liken this situation to wearing different thinking caps, perhaps a solution would be more effective if one were imaginative or creative and another would be better if one were pragmatic.
I like to think of a group of university students that would get together on an assignment and each would sit with writers block on dealing with it even though the group leader suggested that each write a paragraph on the topic. Now was each student clear on what was the goal of that paragraph? I think if a goal was established it would have made contributing a little easier. Secondly dividing the problem pie into smaller pieces was good direction to go but was each person clued in on where to look for information? If they are going to learn from each other's faults the number one issue is not just showing initiative but knowing how to organize their thoughts so that that problem would become divisible into more manageable parts. If the assignment was a paper on how natural economies developed into money based ones which later became credit/debit based ones then knowing how to approach the assignment would facilitate its completion.
I suggested the group would first find out how it is they have unsuccessfully met on several occasions and translate that into how each person can contribute to the paper. Something simple like getting each person to state what his strength is in order to get the research going would then at least get him to accumulate information that could be put into writing. One of the spokespeople said that getting to work together was how they would learn from each other's faults. She was indirectly saying that she was aware of some and in fact their group had met a couple of times and was not getting anywhere.
Not all of the people in the group were friends that most often complicates matters especially when it comes to working with strangers who you have to contact for information. So someone had to mention that they had to put any differences aside if there were any and focus on getting to a common goal.
The problem is everyman's problem and could only be solved by providing a plan on which the others could follow without expecting their neighbour to work up a solution. Was each student given a specific task to avoid and overlap in the research effort? Had she been capable of suggesting a meeting she might consider that getting her colleagues to each look up different material on what countries became credit based would have enabled her to get her to understand her role better as a facilitator. If she did not want to be a facilitator it would then have been apparent that in getting people to write up a paragraph, someone should facilitate the process. A librarian may suggest that process or another person could so that each person then has a clearer picture on what aspect they are going to look up and how to integrate that into the project.
Any organizer could have suggested that someone come forward with what they think natural and money or credit induced economies are just as an introduction to describing diverse economical systems. This would infer that others write the body of the discussion based on statistics or geography or historical influences and another person draw conclusions from all the information.
It was not enough that the leader mentioned that each one writes a paragraph on the assignment without some direction as where the argument would go. Each student could go into different political system that developed a money based economy and look up how money played a part in the development of that nation or why it did not play a crucial role. Finally one student could go into researching why natural economies are still successful in certain populations that live within political borders.
