Quoted from http://www.jroller.com/comments/njain/Weblog/to_master_the_art_problem
Are we obsessed with solutions?
Engineers are very good at providing solutions! But how good are we at stating the real problem?Most of the times we go in and say “this is the solution…“, but does the person really understands what the problem is, in the first place?
Day in and day out we talk about communication problems. Stating the solution and not talking about the problem, doesn‘t it increases the communication problem further?
Is this a problem with the education or the culture or something else? (we need something to point our fingers at!)
Some of my thoughts:From schooling, we are always been within the solution domain and not in the problem domain. You are really appreciated for giving out the right answer in the class but not appreciated for asking the right question.Most of the examinations we have, are based on giving the right answers for a set of question not not for deriving the right question based on a scenario.
But how does this affect my work?1. Analysis is the skill of asking the right questions and then figuring out the solution for the question. But what if you can never ask the right question? How can you be sure that the answer is right? Without having the right question, the whole feed-back mechanism falls apart.
2.From development point of view, asking the right question is the key to TDD. Unless you can ask the right question you will never be able to write the right test.
3.To a great extent, I feel the success of Agile/XP depends on this skill of asking the right question. Since we don‘t have an explicit, upfront design phase, it is very important to know the right question before trying to implement a solution.
Hence I say, “A problem started with the right question is half solved!”
Q.E.D: To master the art of problem solving, master the art of problem stating.
