Creative

Thinking
&
Problem
Solving
 Objectives
1. To understand the Thinking Process
2. To differentiate between Creative & Critical
Thinking
3. To identify various Creative Methods
4. To recognise negative attitudes that block
Creativity
5. To list ways to improve Creative abilities
6. To analyse the basic guidelines for Problem
Solving
 Thinking
• Thinking involves the cerebral manipulation of
information, as when we
– form concepts,
– engage in problem solving,
– reason and
– make decisions.
• Visual thinkers: Artists, engineers, advertisers, good
animal trainers. Form pictures in their minds
• Verbal thinkers: accountants, bankers, and people
who trade in the futures market tend to be highly
verbal thinkers with few pictures in their minds.
• Productive thinking is a result of combining
knowledge with creative/critical thinking
Lateral Thinking
 What is Creativity?
Seeing what everybody has seen, and
thinking what nobody has thought –
Intellectual Inventiveness
“ The Blind Boy”
• An Ability
– To imagine, to invent something new
– Combining, changing or re-applying existing ideas
– In adults, creativity is suppressed thru education
• An Attitude
– Accept change and newness
– Play with ideas
– Flexibility of outlook
• A Process
– Continually to improve ideas & solutions
– Gradual alterations and refinements
– Incrementally
Possible: Can exist or happen. Probable: Likely to happen. Plausible: Seeming to be right or reasonable
•Both type of thinking play
an important role in the
creative process
•Example: Potter making a
vase. Both the soft and
hard elements are
required, but at different
times •Soft thinking in •Hard thinking in
imaginative phase practical phase
•Search new ideas, think •Evaluating ideas,
globally narrowing down to
practical solutions,
running risk analysis,
idea to action
 Horizons of Creativity
Creativity with a meaning
• Creativity is not restricted to thinking. Its
scope and application extends to
– Imaginative exploration & conceptualisation of
difficult problems
– Working out and testing solutions
– Implementation by securing willing cooperation
– Example: Tata Nano
 Creative Methods
• Evolution:
– Incremental improvement.
• Synthesis:
– Two or more existing ideas are combined into a third new
idea
• Revolution:
– Completely different, marked change from the previous
• Re application:
– Look at something old in a new way.
• Changing Direction:
– Attention shifted from one angle of a problem to another
Creative Methods

Evolution:
Incremental improvement
New ideas from previous ideas
Every problem that has been solved can be solved again
in a better way
•TATA Nano, automobiles
• cell phones
•IPL auction of cricketers
The Genesis of TATA Nano
Creative Methods

Synthesis
2 or more existing ideas are combined into a 3rd
new idea
•Malls : Cinema+ Food Court+
Shopping + Entertainment under one roof
•Hospitality = Travel + Tourism
+Healthcare
 Creative Methods

Revolution:
The best new idea is a completely different one, and
marked change from the previous ones
e.g. The Internet, Newspapers to e-paper,
Books-Amazon, e learning,
Telecommunications
 Creative Methods

Reapplication:
Look at something old in a new way
•WiFi in Shatabdi and Rajdhani
•Rly vacant land used as Logistic Hubs
•Tetrapak, Dabur, Amul, hiring rag pickers (in uniform and gloves)
to go door to door to collect re cyclable dry cartons. Tied up with
NGO Stree Shakti Sanghatana
Re-crafting antique furniture
Creative Methods

Changing Direction:
When attention is shifted from one
angle of the problem to another.
Creative insight
•To reduce traffic jams don’t widen
roads, introduce mass transit- metro
rail, car pools
•If you can’t raise the bridge, lower
the river
Why Study Creativity
Why Study Creativity
If you don’t have ability
to innovate, you risk
being left behind
 -ve Attitudes that Block Creativity
• Oh no, a problem!
– Un favourable reaction to a problem
– A problem is an opportunity
• It can’t be done.
– Surrendering before the battle
– Giving the problem a power or strength it did not have
before
– “ The difficult we do immediately; the impossible takes a
little longer”
 -ve Attitudes that Block Creativity
• I can’t do it. Or, there’s nothing I can do.
– The problem can be solved by an expert , but I am not
– Wright brothers were cycle mechanics.
– Submarine was designed by a clergyman
– Innovation in industry almost always comes from people
outside the area of invention
• But I’m not creative
– Everyone is creative to some extent
– Discover the creative within you
 -ve Attitudes that Block Creativity
• That’s childish
– Our effort to appear always mature and sophisticated,
ridicule the creative and playful attitude
• What will people think?
– Strong social pressure to conform and to be ordinary and
not creative
• I might fail
– Fear of failure is a major obstacle to creativity.
Thomas Edison, in his search for the perfect filament for a
bulb, tried about 1800 things
 Characteristics of a Creative person
• Curiosity. Mingles, combines, • Tolerance of ambiguity
differentiates his experiences in • Strong sense of autonomy
order to generate non-obvious • Not bound by group standards
and new concepts and control
• Problems are emotionally • Enjoys challenge
acceptable
• Optimistic
• Openness and independence of
• Able to suspend judgment
thinking and judgement
• Accepting and reconciling • Comfortable with imagination,
apparent opposites and visualisation
paradoxes • Challenges assumptions
• Perseveres, works hard
Improving Your Creative Abilities
•

• Keep track of your ideas at all times.

• Pose new questions to yourself every day.

• Keep abreast of your field.

• Engage in creative hobbies

• Have courage and self-confidence.

• Learn to know and understand yourself.

Improving Your Creative Abilities
• Learn about things outside your specialty.

• Avoid rigid, set patterns of doing things.

• Be open and receptive to ideas

• Be alert in your observations.

• Adopt a risk taking attitude..

• Keep your sense of humor.

 Problem Solving

‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’ – The fly who couldn't get
out of the window pane
Moral: Trying harder isn’t necessarily the solution to
achieving more; trying something different can work
miracles
“ Problems cannot be solved by thinking within the
framework in which problems were created”
…. Albert Einstein
 Problem Solving
• Problem solving forms part of thinking. Considered
the most complex of all intellectual functions,
problem solving has been defined as higher-order
cognitive process
• We may need to solve some problems not by
removing the cause but by designing the way
forward even if the cause remains in place. –
(Edward de Bono)
• Lateral thinking can be used to help in solving
problems but can also be used for much more.
 Problem Magnification
• At first, problems seem to be
– Huge
– Overwhelming Feeling of helplessness and
intimidation
– Complex
– Consequences
Approaches for Solving Problems
• The ‘So What’ approach
– Extracting maximum info from facts
• The ‘5Why’ approach
– Helps to quickly get to the root of the problem
• The Drill Down technique
– Break complicated problems down to simple parts
• The ‘4D’ approach
– Focus on what’s going right
 5 Why Approach
One why will lead to the next why
1. Why is our client unhappy
Because we did not deliver the service on time
2. Why were we unable to stick to the schedule
Because job took longer than we thought
3. Why did it take longer
We underestimated the complexity of the job
4. Why did we underestimate
Because we made a quick estimate of the time needed, and did not list
the individual stages
5. Why did’nt we list individual stages
Because we were running behind on other projects. We
clearly need to review our time estimation
 4D Approach
Define the problem in a positive terminology
Seeing a problem from what’s going right
Ways to avoid failing in exam Vs. Ways to improve my marks

• Discovery: Look for the best

for what has happened in the Discovery
past (highest marks)
• Dream: Build on your
discovery and dream of ‘what Dream
can be’
• Design: Strategies that will
enable the dream to be Design
realised
• Deliver: Implementation
stage- planning & preparation Deliver
“ We are all contiuously faced with a
series of enormous opportunities,
brilliantly disguised as insoluble
problems”
END
 1. How many animals of each species did
Moses take upon the ark with him?
The story goes that NOAH
A. 0 was on the ark, not MOSES.
Our minds internalize
B. 1 cultural narratives and
C. 2 assumptions. We hear bits
of such narratives and “fill
D. infinite in” the rest, even when it is
not there. Therefore,
language often evokes
“realities” in our minds that
are not real or accurate.
Answer: A. 0

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 2. Count the “F’s” in the following:
“FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE-
SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIF-
IC STUDY COMBINED WITH
THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS.”
A. 3
B. 4 Because we often
“speak” the words
C. 5 in our minds as we
D. 6 read them, we don’t
“hear” the “F’s”
because they don’t
Answer: D. 6 “sound” like “F’s”
FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE-
SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIF-
IC STUDY COMBINED WITH
THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS.
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 3. The 9-dot problem: With the mouse and line-drawing tool,
connect all 9 dots with each other with 4 and only 4 completely
straight lines.
1
3

To solve this problem, you

literally have to think
“outside of the box.” We tend
to think in terms of familiar
objects, such as “boxes” or
rooms, project the properties
of a container onto these 9
dots, and then act as if there
are “sides” or walls to the
4 box that constrain our lines.

2
48
 4. How many squares are in the figure below?

11 12 13 14
People often miss the
correct answer on this
27 31 28 problem due to lack of
motivation to find all
15 36
16 17
37 18 the boxes. Once a
large number has
1 2 5 6 been found, it often
32
9 35
40 10
33 “seems good enough.”
3 4 7 8
19 38
20 21
39 22
29 34 30 Answer: 40

23 24 25 26
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