Problem Solving for Executives Part 3

Affinity Diagrams - Organizing Ideas Into Common Themes


Is it ever a bad thing to have too many ideas?
Probably not, but if you've ever experienced information overload or struggled to know where to begin with a wealth of data you've been given, you may have wondered how you can use all of these ideas effectively. When there's lots of "stuff" coming at you, it is hard to sort through everything and organize the information in a way that makes sense and helps you make decisions.

Whether you're brainstorming ideas, trying to solve a problem or analyzing a situation, when you are dealing with lots of information from a variety of sources, you can end up spending a huge amount of time trying to assimilate all the little bits and pieces. Rather than letting the disjointed information get the better of you, you can use an affinity diagram to help you organize it.

Also called the KJ method, after its developer Kawakita Jiro (a Japanese anthropologist) an affinity diagram helps to synthesize large amounts of data by finding relationships between ideas. The information is then gradually structured from the bottom up into meaningful groups. From there you can clearly "see" what you have, and then begin your analysis or come to a decision.

Affinity diagrams can be used to:

Draw out common themes from a large amount of information.

Discover previously unseen connections between various ideas or information.

Brainstorm root causes and solutions to a problem.

Because many decision-making exercises begin with brainstorming, this is one of the most common applications of affinity diagrams.

After a brainstorming session there are usually pages of ideas. These won't have been censored or edited in any way, many of them will be very similar, and many will also be closely related to others in a variety of ways. What an affinity diagram does is start to group the ideas into themes. From the chaos of the randomly generated ideas comes an insight into the common threads that link groups of them together. From there the solution or best idea often emerges quite naturally.

This is why affinity diagrams are so powerful and why the Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers consider them one of the "seven management tools."

Affinity diagrams are not the domain of brainstorming alone though. They can be used in any situation where:

The solution is not readily apparent.

You want to reach a consensus or decision and have a lot of variables to consider, concepts to discuss, ideas to connect, or opinions to incorporate.

There is a large volume of information to sort through.

Here is a step-by-step guide to using affinity diagrams along with a simple example to show how the process works.


How to Use the Tool


1) Describe the problem or issue

2) Generate ideas by brainstorming.

Write each idea on a separate sticky note and put these on a wall or flip chart.
Remember to:

Emphasize volume.

Suspend judgment.

Piggyback on other ideas





3) Sort ideas into natural themes by asking:

What ideas are similar?

Is this idea connected to any of the others?


If you're working in a team:


Separate into smaller groups of 3 to 4 people.

Sort the ideas IN SILENCE so that no one is influenced by anyone else's comments.

Keep moving the cards around until consensus is reached.



4) Create total group consensus:

Discuss the shared meaning of each of the sorted groups.

Continue until consensus is reached.

If some ideas do not fit into any theme, separate them as "stand-alone" ideas.

If some ideas fit into more than one theme, create a duplicate card and put it in the proper group.

Try to limit the total number of themes to between five and nine.


5) Create theme cards (also called affinity cards or header cards):

Create a short 3-5 word description for the relationship.

If you're working in a group, do this together, out loud.

Write this theme/header on a blank card and place at the top of the group it describes.

Create a "super-headers" where necessary to group themes.

Use a "sub-header" card where necessary as well.




6) Continue to group the themes/headers until you have reached the broadest, but still meaningful, categories possible:

Draw lines connecting the super-headers, themes/headers, and sub-headers.

You'll end up with a hierarchical structure that shows, at a glance, where the relationships are.


Tip:Grouping ideas under headings, and then grouping headings under super-headers in an affinity diagram is a practical way of "chunking" information generated in brainstorming sessions, during process mapping, or even a planning exercise.


Key Points

Affinity diagrams are great tools for assimilating and understanding large amounts of information. When you work through the process of creating relationships and working backward from detailed information to broad themes, you get an insight you would not otherwise find.

The next time you are confronting a large amount of information or number of ideas and you feel overwhelmed at first glance, use the affinity diagram approach to discover all the hidden linkages. And when you cannot see the forest for the trees, an affinity diagram may be exactly what you need to get back in focus.

To download the FREE Affinity Diagram Software, visit:

http://www.smartdraw.com/specials/affinity-diagram-software.htm?id=324616

Problem Solving for Executives Part 2

Welcome to Problem Solving Skills
Part 2


Cause and Effect Diagrams

Identifying the likely Causes of Problems related variants: Fish or Fishbone Diagrams, and Ishikawa Diagrams


Cause and Effect Diagrams help you to think through causes of a problem thoroughly. Their major benefit is that they push you to consider all possible causes of the problem, rather than just the ones that are most obvious.


The approach combines brainstorming with use of a type of concept map.


Cause and Effect Diagrams are also known as Fishbone Diagrams, because a completed diagram can look like the skeleton of a fish.


How to Use the Tool:


Follow these steps to solve a problem with a Cause and Effect Diagram:


Identify the problem:

Write down the exact problem you face in detail. Where appropriate identify who is involved, what the problem is, and when and where it occurs.

Write the problem in a box on the left hand side of a large sheet of paper.

Draw a line across the paper horizontally from the box.

This arrangement, looking like the head and spine of a fish, gives you space to develop ideas.


Work out the major factors involved:


Next identify the factors that may contribute to the problem.

Draw lines off the spine for each factor, and label it. These may be people involved with the problem, systems, equipment, materials, external forces, etc.

Try to draw out as many possible factors as possible. If you are trying to solve the problem as part of a group, then this may be a good time for some brainstorming.

Using the 'Fish bone' analogy, the factors you find can be thought of as the bones of the fish.


Identify possible causes:


For each of the factors you considered in stage 2, brainstorm possible causes of the problem that may be related to the factor. Show these as smaller lines coming off the 'bones' of the fish. Where a cause is large or complex, then it may be best to break the it down into sub-causes. Show these as lines coming off each cause line.



Analyze your diagram:


By this stage you should have a diagram showing all the possible causes of your problem that you can think of. Depending on the complexity and importance of the problem, you can now investigate the most likely causes further. This may involve setting up investigations, carrying out surveys, etc. These will be designed to test whether your assessments are correct.

Example:

The example below shows a Cause & Effect diagram drawn by a manager who is having trouble getting cooperation from a branch office:




To get a closer look on a Pdf file, e-mail Helena at: nyman@consultant.com. Please write Cause and Effect Diagram Pdf File in the subject line!

If the manager had not thought the problem through, he might have dealt with the problem by assuming that people were being difficult.

Instead he might think that the best approach is to arrange a meeting with the Branch Manager. This would allow him to brief the manager fully, and talk through any problems that he may be facing.

Key points:

Cause & Effect analysis (or Fishbone Analysis) provides a structured way to help you think through all possible causes of a problem. This helps you to carry out a thorough analysis of a situation.

Problem Solving for Executives Part 1

Welcome to Problem Solving Skills Part 1

The tools in this section help you solve complicated business problems.
By using these techniques, you can start to tackle problems that might otherwise seem huge, overwhelming, and excessively complex.

As such, these tools give you a starting point in solving problems that would leave other people feeling helpless, and intimidated by the situation.

The section starts with some simple complexity skills. It then moves on to look at more powerful, 'industrial strength" techniques like use of Systems Diagrams, SWOT Analysis, Cash Flow Forecasting and Risk Analysis. We conclude with four powerful business strategy tools: Porter's Five Forces, PEST Analysis, Value Chain Analysis and USP Analysis.

Enjoy using these tools!

Before we go the the more complicating techniques, I would like to introduce you to 2 very simple techniques:

1) Appreciation: Extracting Maximum Information from Facts

2) 5 Whys - Getting quickly to the root of a problem
Appreciation

Extracting Maximum Information from Facts


Appreciation is a very simple but powerful technique for extracting the maximum amount of information from a simple fact.


How to Use the Tool:

Starting with a fact, ask the question 'So what?' i.e. what are the implications of that fact? Keep on asking that question until you have drawn all possible inferences.


Example:

Appreciation is a technique used by military planners, so we will take a military example:

Fact: It rained heavily last night
So What?
- The ground will be wet
So What?
- It will turn into mud quickly
So What?
- If many troops and vehicles pass over the same ground, movement will be progressively slower and more difficult as the ground gets muddier and more difficult.
So What?
- Where possible, stick to paved roads. Otherwise expect movement to be much slower than normal.


While it would be possible to reach this conclusion without the use of a formal technique, Appreciation provides a framework within which you can extract information quickly, effectively and reliably.

Key points: Asking 'so what?' repeatedly helps you to extract all important information implied by a fact.


5 Whys

Quickly Getting to the Root of a Problem

Why use the tool?

The 5 Whys is a simple problem-solving technique that helps users to get to the root of the problem quickly. Made popular in the 1970s by the Toyota Production System, the 5 Whys strategy involves looking at any problem and asking: "Why?" and "What caused this problem?"


Very often, the answer to the first "why" will prompt another "why" and the answer to the second "why" will prompt another and so on; hence the name the 5 Whys strategy.

Benefits of the 5 Whys include:


It helps to quickly determine the root cause of a problem It is easy to learn and apply How to use the tool:

When looking to solve a problem, start at the end result and work backward (toward the root cause), continually asking: "Why?" This will need to be repeated over and over until the root cause of the problem becomes apparent.

Tip:

The 5 Whys technique is a simple technique that can help you quickly get to the root of a problem. But that is all it is, and the more complex things get, the more likely it is to lead you down a false trail. if it doesn't quickly give you an answer that's obviously right, then you may need more sophisticated technique problem solving techniques like those found in our problem solving section.


Example:

Following is an example of the 5 Whys analysis as an effective problem-solving technique:

Why is our client, Hinson Corp., unhappy? Because we did not deliver our services when we said we would.

Why were we unable to meet the agreed-upon timeline or schedule for delivery? The job took much longer than we thought it would.

Why did it take so much longer? Because we underestimated the complexity of the job.

Why did we underestimate the complexity of the job? Because we made a quick estimate of the time needed to complete it, and did not list the individual stages needed to complete the project.

Why didn't we do this? Because we were running behind on other projects. We clearly need to review our time estimation and specification procedures. Key Points:

The 5 Whys strategy is an easy and often-effective tool for uncovering the root of a problem. Because it is so elementary in nature, it can be adapted quickly and applied to most any problem. Bear in mind, however, that if it doesn't prompt an intuitive answer, other problem-solving techniques may need to be applied.