Mission Control, Houston, April 13, 1970 (Source: NASA)
The photo was taken a little before the explosion on the ill-fated Apollo 13 mission to the moon. The movie Apollo 13 made famous the quotes: “Houston, we have a problem” and “Failure is not an option”. The former is a variation of the actual statement made by astronaut Jack Swigert: “Houston, we’ve had a problem here.” In the movie, Gene Kranz, a flight director (shown with his back to the camera in the photo) says that failure is not an option. It is not something he said in reality. However, getting the Apollo 13 astronauts back to Earth safely is one of the great stories of problem solving.
Problem Solving is Not the Same as Decision Making
Although they represent different ideas, the terms problem solving and decision making are frequently used interchangeably. Without being aware of the difference between these complementary terms, it is possible to make a decision and not solve the problem well or not solve the right problem. The labels and concepts we use influence how we think and what we do.
Decision making is the task of choosing from two or more options. We may have developed the options ourselves or someone else (e.g., colleague, person we report to, or client) may have given them to us. Sometimes, we simply choose the first reasonable option or solution that comes to our mind. While it is possible to make a bad choice from good options, more insidiously, we can make bad choices by limiting ourselves to the few given to us by someone else or adopting the first reasonable idea that strikes us. Good choices come from linking decision making to problem solving, from spending time generating options or solution possibilities, and then making the best choice possible.
Over the last few years, books by writers such as Daniel Kahneman, Richard Thaler, Dan Ariely, and several others have become bestsellers. They deal with systematic errors (cognitive biases) that we are all prone to while making choices. It is important to recognize that these works provide ideas about decision making, not problem solving. Take Kahneman’s remarkable book Thinking, Fast and Slow as an example. Its profound insights stem largely from lab studies where people (usually students) were asked to choose from two options presented to them. Their choices reveal the kinds of systematic cognitive errors we all make. The many studies done by Kahneman and his co-author Amos Tversky, and a growing number of researchers have been influential in many fields (business, medicine, public policy, political science, economics, and others). They make us better choosers, not necessarily better problem solvers. Problem solving is a harder task and also one that is far more challenging to research (which is why most research deals with decision making, not problem solving).
Problem solving comprises activities that precede decision making. It includes recognizing the need to solve a problem in a situation, learning more about the situation to understand it better and using judgment to articulate the problem, gathering further data to perform needed analyses and draw conclusions, and generating ideas for solutions (i.e., options). Choosing from among these options, or making a decision, follows. Problem solving and decision making are therefore complementary activities.
The distinction between the two activities was made by Nobel laureates Herbert Simon, Richard Thaler, Thomas Schelling, and several pioneering researchers including Amos Tversky, Robin Hogarth, Howard Raiffa, and others [1].
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REFERENCES
[1] Simon, HA, Dantzig, GB, Hogarth, R, Plott CR, Raiffa H, Schelling TC, Shepsle, KA, Thaler, R, Tversky, A, & Winter, S. (1973). “Decision making and problem solving,” Interfaces, 17(5): 11-31.