Reading Sherlock Holmes & Dr Watson as a child captivated my young mind for hours. Sherlock, with his unerring eye for detail, would announce “The game’s afoot Watson!” and dash out the door after another adventure with Watson hot on his tail!
The bad guys were ALWAYS caught!
Life & Business issues and problems are not always so keenly unraveled with a “bad-guy-caught” ending. We in this industry often face messy compromises, losses, or even lawsuits instead.
Since you know there are certain elements that make up the issues and problems to discover, so you can implement a solution, let’s turn to the style of Sherlock & Watson of problem solving.
“Let me run over the principal steps. Approached the issue, with an absolutely blank mind, which is an advantage. We had formed no theories. We were simply there to observe and to draw inferences from our observations.” – Sherlock Holmes
Probably one of the most important steps, keep a clear mind, free of predisposed assumptions about what you believe the cause of the effect to be, before collecting your data.
“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.”
– Sherlock Holmes
Step back and look at the problem piece by piece. Collect factual data that correlates to the problem.
“In solving a problem of this sort, the grand thing is to be able to reason backwards…
Let me see if I can make it clearer. Most people, if you describe a train of events to them, will tell you what the result would be. They can put those events together in their minds, and argue from them that something will come to pass. There are few people, however, who, if you told them a result, would be able to evolve from their own inner consciousness what the steps were which led up to that result. This power is what I mean when I talk of reasoning backwards, or analytically.”
– Sherlock Holmes
Problems can be viewed as a puzzle. There are many pieces that fit together to show you the whole picture. If you look at those pieces individually, you can clearly see what each piece represents. Holmes’ method of problem-solving starts with seeing the whole picture first, and working back to the first piece, from the effect down to the cause.
As you collect your data, sort the pieces by type. Is it emotionally charged? Is it a limiting personal belief? Or is it a problem based on time (or lack there of)? Once your problem is broken down and sorted, begin putting solutions into place, saving the emotionally charged pieces for last – some may dissipate or disappear by completing the other two sets first.
Many of your problem pieces will be out of your control because they will involve someone other than yourself. As we have all learned with age and experience – the ONLY thing we can control is how we FEEL and what we DO about any given situation, person, thing, etc.
That being said, I will leave you with one of the coolest tools that I recently learned from ONE OF Y’ALL –
Gratitude Snacks:
Keep a dish (or several) nearby and fill it with pieces of paper you have written something you are grateful for on. Don’t forget, you gotta refill the snacks you do not want them going stale!
How to use: When you are feeling irritated, overwhelmed, or angry… take out a gratitude snack (maybe 2-3) to read and pull you back into emotion control.
Scientific fact is that you cannot be angry & grateful at the same time!!!
I say let us all take Gratitude Snacks to the next level! Make personalized company snack templates to hand out to your clients. They can fill out a few things they are grateful for and store them in their wallet or purse for when they need a snack. Pro tip, let them know how grateful for them you are on the cards.
Give those out to all your customers, friends, and family and just WATCH the magic that happens! I believe Gratitude to be one tool we can all use, teach, and certainly master!
Sherlock: Change is afoot dear Watson…
Create a merry month of May my friends,
Tom
