Problem Solving Apps

I was amongst the audience to a couple of pitches by youth entrepreneurs and this archetype of “we found this problem, and we created an app / website to solve it, we need money to scale this solution now” kept recurring. Defining and highlighting the problem is a significant step to identifying the solution – but the inherent elements of the problems that allows it to be solved using information technology has to be related to information.

The nature of problem solving is such that it should be mostly about the problem and less about the solution. I find it useful when people are able to characterise problems so clearly and well that the solution becomes almost a no-brainer. That’s really the value of most consultants because when we have problems, we tend to ask ‘What’s wrong’ but we don’t really observe the situation well. We are not going down enough into the way the problem distracts us from our end goal – rather, we focus on the phenomena we want to address rather than the mission we hope to accomplish.

I think before we articulate problems, we should first consider what is the mission in the subtext of the problem statement. Then draw out clear implications and consequences of not addressing the problem before diving into solutioning. And each part of the solution should speak to that subtext, and continue helping users get back on their feet to go about what they had wanted to do.

Too many solutions in the world are actually not about solving problems but about giving users new missions instead of old ones. They are more about distracting them from the root of their challenges. Take cosmetics for example; they pretend to deal with image when self-image is the underlying issue to be address. Imagine a beauty company that focuses on psychology as a solution. Won’t that be truly innovative?

Staying Small

When I was in secondary school, I was part of a debate team that had to argue against the house during a round of debate where the motion was ‘This house believes that size matters’. It was a truistic motion; there was no way we could argue against it. The proposition simply has to define size in a way that is broad and all-encompassing including physical, or any other measurable metric, and size matters – not just when it is big but also when it’s small.

Size matters, and sometimes there’s nothing wrong with being small and refusing to scale. Not scaling is different from not growing. A. business can grow in different ways and it’s not just about size. Revenues can grow through pricing up and providing more value for the services rendered to the same client base. Profits can also grow if the products and services can be delivered at ever-increasing efficiency.

Sometimes businesses stays small because the potential client base they are good at servicing is just that group and the business sustains well with healthy margin without forcefully growing. I think we have to understand and appreciate that even from an economic development point of view. This is contributing to diversity and richness in an economy. There’s no need for every business to be like a Starbucks, MacDonalds, or IKEA.

Effort in vain

Does success teach us anything? What can we learn from success if we try to examine the elements of luck that is incorporated? A whole load; it is important for us to recognise whether we are studying success to retrospectively tease out our brilliance or to really examine which part of our efforts actually contribute our success.

One of the problems I notice about people used to achieving success and smart about hacking ‘wins’ is that they want to optimise effort and they hate it when effort is squandered along the way not towards the success they wanted. Yet learning doesn’t work this way. Learning, being creative, solving problems, trying things out is always about applying effort in vain towards the ‘goal’.

But if you notice that your goal is instead is to be a better person, to grow your skills, to deepen your experience, to serve others. Then, detours are just opportunities. And ‘failures’, won’t be in vain. Your efforts are gifts to the world and they are never in vain.

Chats & meetings

I realised how important the social glue of interactions before and after meetings are. There is the ability to just pull someone aside to say something that doesn’t take more than 45 seconds. Or to pay attention to actual visual cues of other people while someone else is speaking. Or to just be a little more fuzzy with time and disappear somewhere when things ends early. Now, in the world of video calls and packed schedules, we need to be deliberate about all that. We also need to be deliberate about creating breaks between meetings, the fake ‘commute’ across buildings or just between meeting rooms.

And the kind of ‘tap on the shoulder’ conversation. It now feels weird to be ‘going to someone’ just to say one or two thing – ie. give them a call on the phone or video conference software – must no longer stop us from doing so. Now it’s less efficient to call together 5-6 people together and get them to chip in for a birthday gift to a colleague compared to just shouting out in the office when that birthday guy/girl is away. Yet if this is the only way we can go about it, we just have to do it this way.

Technology has improved tremendously to allow for deeper, better social interactions and they continue to advance. Sure, they might ever beat the actual, in-person interactions. But for someone terminally ill to meet his/her son/daughter who is miles away in another country, technology makes a huge difference. A video call could bring incredible amount of closure. We simply must look to these substitutes to achieve the results we need. It’s going to be important for our mental health.

Turn off notifications

Do you want to know a secret? Notifications are designed to get our attention: the drop-down banner, or the red badge, or the alert on your lock screen, the little 2 syllable sound that tells you that you need to check your phone. Or that vibration in your pocket. The problem is that it keeps coming.

“Okay”

“Where are you”

“Hi Kevin”

We underestimate the stress and anxiety it create in others when we have messaging etiquette that just spills out messages like in a conversation as if the person should respond to you. Yes the messages are sent instantly. But no, you’re not supposed to expect instant replies.

Want to reduce your daily stress? Turn off notification. Don’t bother checking for stray messages except in time you allocated and scheduled to check. And make sure you schedule them during periods where you have the headspace to actually deal with them. If it’s urgent, let them call you.

Rising expectations

If we take stock of the advancement in living standards over the course of the last 3 generations, the improvements have undoubtedly been phenomenal. Yet the average experience of life as perceived subjectively seemed to have barely become more joyful.

If anything, our generation seem more disappointed, emotionally worn and exhausted than the previous. I’m afraid it is entirely because out expectations, our hopes and dreams have continually outpaced the improvements we experienced.

Every time something genuinely gets better, our expectation rises by so much more. And it seems, we have come to associate expectations with having standards that it is a bit toxic on our mental health. We have to learn to clean up our thinking about standards we uphold for ourselves and the kind of expectations we put upon others. Making others responsible for our happiness is pretty much a sure route to unhappiness.

Purpose on a platter

The fresh grads entering the job market and other young adults still finding their bearings in the market often want to be paid well and also have a sense of purpose in their career. They sometimes fantasize about the sense of purpose in fields they did not enter: medicine, teaching, psychology, etc.

On the other hand I’ve known cynical doctors, wearied teachers and exhausted psychologists who knows their purpose but are so worn out by work they wonder how things square. Then there are banker friends who made tonnes of money and think they need to do their part for the world and hence, get involved in sustainable finance (which honestly have mixed track record and credentials).

Purpose does not come with a job; at least not served on a platter. The story that runs in our mind about our work gives us the sense of purpose. Of course the story must compel us positively and move us forward in the direction the career tend towards. This alignment is not to be taken for granted. One can be promoted into misalignment because the career progress doesn’t fit the story of greater purpose – it can become diminished purpose.

That is why I care so much about stories. Especially the stories we tell ourselves; and this is why I enjoy coaching others especially on careers – the alignment (purpose), the planning (strategy) and the tactics involved. I’m writing an eBook which I hope to share with my readers. Watch this space for more details to follow.

Diet Coke and Fried Chicken

I’ve been having cravings for coke and fried chicken. Well, Diet Coke because sugar has been causing me to be anxious and a bit unwell lately so I tried to shape the craving a little. But then Coke and Fried Chicken are bad for me overall – so why is it that I can’t shape them further and convert them to something else? Why is Diet Coke a valid substitute for coke but not water? How about fried chicken? Can it not be substituted with broccoli?

What we think of as substitutable when it comes to such taste/preferences is interesting. Not least because there are some outrageous substituting going on when we choose to spend time scrolling through social media as oppose to interacting with those physically around us. Or if we decide to substitute entertainment on a screen for sleep. I think it’s important we are conscious about what we are substituting in our lives more deeply.

Are you substituting a high pay check for meaning in your work? Is liking photos on instagram and commenting on people’s posts a substitute for real-world friendly interactions with others? Is buying expensive salads a substitute for working out in your mind? Would you substitute the high stress but high paying career for a lower stress and low paid career? What can money substitute in your life?

Coercion of Free Markets

Inequality is a market failure. We do pick this up in A Levels but then there’s little discourse on that. Not only do we dwell little on the solutions – which ranges from progressive taxation to welfare handouts – we ultimately ignore how inequality undermines the ultimate roles of markets, which is the efficient allocation of resources. I’ve always grasp the idea rather intuitively but then fail to deliver it in a philosophical and economics framework. I’ve pointed out the lack of philosophical musings in today’s study of Economics when I introduced Michael Sandel’s lecture on Markets and Morals.

I’ve always pose the question to my Economics student, if a person earns $1000 a month and another who earns $1 a month both needs a glass of water. The rich guy is willing to pay $10 for the water while the poor one is willing to pay $1. The market thus allocates the water to the rich man. We all know that this allocation is problematic and it doesn’t seem efficient; how is it that, in terms of willingness to pay, a person who is only willing to part with 1% of his monthly income gets the good when another is willing to part with 100% of his monthly income for it? So what exactly is the problem of inequality?

Once again, Michael Sandel points this out in the second lecture presented in this video. You don’t exactly have to watch the lecture in order to grasp the point but the idea is that when inequality (in terms of unequal distribution of income) exists, effective demand cannot properly reflect the ideal sort of demand signal transmission that would allow the market to allocate resources efficiently. In extreme cases, free markets becomes not entirely free. In other words, people are not transacting out of their free will but coerced by their own economic circumstances. We see this very often in the case of poor people in developing countries who are forced to sell organs, resort to prostitution, act as surrogate mothers, become a runner for crack.

Gary Becker is not wrong about the rationality of these people. They’re making rational choices but it is often that their choices is very much limited. That unfeeling market processes coerce us into certain decisions is something close to the hearts of all of us. Often, however, we can’t quite work out what is so unjust about that because we believe that to a large extent, we determine our riches. Somehow, deep in our hearts we know that some other decisions that we made caused us to be in the state we are in such that we are coerced into making that next decision. The fact that this argument comes back to us shows how each and every decision made in the marketplace by us are not independent. This makes for a determinism argument in a market setting where free will is supposed to reign.

There are much wider implications of all these arguments and I shall explore them if I get the chance.

Ditch Digging Passion

I once read a book of letters and speeches written by Richard Feynman, compiled by his daughter, Michelle Feynman. In a letter he wrote to a college freshman, he shares some invaluable advice:

“Work hard to find something that fascinates you. When you find it, you will know your lifework, A man may be digging a ditch for someone else, or because he is forced to, or is stupid – such a man is ‘toolish’ -while another working even harder may not be recognized by the bystanders – but he may be digging for treasure. So dig for treasure and when you find it, you will know what to do. In the meantime, you don’t need to make the decision – steer your practical affairs so the alternatives remain open to you…. The man happy in his work is not the narrow specialist, nor the well-rounded man, but a man who is doing what he loves.”

– Richard P. Feynman

I came across this quote in my own blog, while trying to recycle some ideas for a university program application essay. I think it is natural for people to pursue the things they are interested or passionate about. Some may be naturally good at it, while others may not be as adept as others at it in the beginning; it is inevitable that sometimes our vision gets obstructed by the smoke and haze ahead.

Let Feynman’s words serve as a reminder for all of us.