how to solve big problems

How to Solve Big Problems

In late November of 1991, a three-year-old girl was diagnosed with leukemia. There was a 30 percent chance she would die.

In the coming months, she would receive a long list of chemotherapy drugs: 6MP, asparaginase, methotrexate, prednisone, and vincrinstine. The miracle was not only that these drugs could potentially cure her, but that they existed at all.

In his fantastic book, The Emperor of All Maladies ( audiobook ), author and physician Sid Mukherjee explains the history of cancer and how brilliant physicians and scientists finally began to discover cures for the disease.

You see, for many years, doctors and scientists dreamed of finding a single cure for all cancers. They searched for a radical surgery or a miracle drug that could cure everything from breast cancer to leukemia to prostate cancer. According to Mukherjee, however, breakthroughs finally came when scientists stopped trying to tackle this large-scale problem and made the problem smaller.

The first breakthrough came when Sidney Farber, now known as the Father of Modern Chemotherapy, decided to focus exclusively on treating leukemia. He was one of the first physicians to dedicate his efforts solely to a single type of cancer and by narrowing his focus Farber was able to make significant progress against this single condition.

Eventually, the drugs and treatments Farber uncovered for leukemia led to new solutions for other cancers. By focusing on one tiny vertical, Farber uncovered answers that could be used to treat the larger problem. As Mukherjee put it, “[By] focusing microscopically on a single disease, one could extrapolate into the entire universe of diseases.” 1

This central idea, that solving large complex problems is often accomplished by first attacking smaller micro-problems, is useful not just for cancer treatments, but for life in general.

The main lesson mentioned above is simple: When you’re facing a complex problem or trying to do something bold, start with a smaller version of the larger problem. Focus exclusively on that small problem and solve it. Use the answers to this small issue to expand your knowledge of the larger issue. Repeat.

If you take a look around, you can see this pattern playing out everywhere.

For example, consider Amazon. The company started by selling books. Once they mastered the online purchase and delivery process of books, they moved on to other products. Today, they sell just about everything.

Amazon could have started by trying to solve the big problem: how do we master digital commerce? Instead, they started with a narrow focus and expanded from there. It has been proven many times that this small-to-large approach works well for businesses, and I think it can be very useful for our personal goals as well.

The Idea in Practice

Let’s consider a few examples of how we might put this idea into practice to develop our own problem solving skills.

Creativity. BIG PROBLEM: How do I become more creative?

Small solution: If you want to become a good photographer, then start small. Learn how to take a really good picture of a chair. Once you can take a fantastic picture of a chair, use those principles — light, composition, lines, curves — to take better pictures of everything.

Exercise. BIG PROBLEM: How can I start exercising consistently?

Small solution: If you can’t crack the fitness code and struggle to exercise consistently, then forget about every other exercise and just learn how to do one pushup. Use the steps I describe here to increase your number slowly. Stick with that one exercise for days, weeks, months. Once you prove to yourself that you can solve this small problem, use the lessons you learn to become more consistent at exercise in general.

Nutrition. BIG PROBLEM: How can I eat healthy each day?

Small solution: Want to improve your nutrition? Maybe you should ignore switching to a new diet at first. You don’t need to change all of your food habits at once. You could start by solving a very small segment of the problem: eat one vegetable today. Master that. Do it for four weeks. Or longer. Take what you learn about being consistent with that one thing and apply it to adding a second healthy food.

And finally…

Narrowing your focus is a mental model that you can apply whenever you want to start a new behavior or take on a new project that seems too big or overwhelming or complex to handle. It is a filter you can run larger problems through to approach issues from a more useful place.

So, how do you solve big problems? Start with a smaller one.

That three-year-old girl who was diagnosed with leukemia and treated with the drugs that were discovered through the Father of Chemotherapy, Sidney Farber? It was my sister. More than 20 years later, she is alive and well.

I’m very glad Farber decided to start small.

The Emperor of All Maladies by Sid Mukherjee, pg. 159

Thanks for reading. You can get more actionable ideas in my popular email newsletter. Each week, I share 3 short ideas from me, 2 quotes from others, and 1 question to think about. Over 2,000,000 people subscribe . Enter your email now and join us.

James Clear writes about habits, decision making, and continuous improvement. He is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller, Atomic Habits . The book has sold over 10 million copies worldwide and has been translated into more than 50 languages.

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How to Solve Big Problems: Start Small

Lessons learned from cancer scientists about how to solve large, complex issues.

By James Clear • Aug 18, 2014

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

In late November of 1991, a three-year-old girl was diagnosed with leukemia. There was a 30 percent chance she would die.

In the coming months, she would receive a long list of chemotherapy drugs: 6MP, asparaginase, methotrexate, prednisone, and vincrinstine. The miracle was not only that these drugs could potentially cure her, but that they existed at all.

In his fantastic book, The Emperor of All Maladies , author and physician Sid Mukherjee explains the history of cancer and how brilliant physicians and scientists finally began to discover cures for the disease.

You see, for many years, doctors and scientists dreamed of finding a single cure for all cancers. They searched for a radical surgery or a miracle drug that could cure everything from breast cancer to leukemia to prostate cancer. According to Mukherjee, however, breakthroughs finally came when scientists stopped trying to tackle this large scale problem and made the problem smaller.

Related: How You Can Stop Making Bad Decisions -- Now

The first breakthrough came when Sidney Farber, now known as the Father of Modern Chemotheraphy, decided to focus exclusively on treating leukemia. He was one of the first physicians to dedicate his efforts solely to a single type of cancer and by narrowing his focus Farber was able to make significant progress against this single condition.

Eventually, the drugs and treatments Farber uncovered for leukemia led to new solutions for other cancers. By focusing on one tiny vertical, Farber uncovered answers that could be used to treat the larger problem. As Mukherjee put it, "[By] focusing microscopically on a single disease, one could extrapolate into the entire universe of diseases."

This central idea, that solving large complex problems is often accomplished by first attacking smaller micro-problems, is useful not just for cancer treatments, but for life in general.

How to Solve Complex Problems

The main lesson mentioned above is simple: When you're facing a complex problem or trying to do something bold, start with a smaller version of the larger problem. Focus exclusively on that small problem and solve it. Use the answers to this small issue to expand your knowledge of the larger issue. Repeat.

If you take a look around, you can see this pattern playing out everywhere.

Related: What to Do When You Have Too Many Ideas and Not Enough Time

For example, consider Amazon. The company started by selling books. Once they mastered the online purchase and delivery process of books, they moved on to other products. Today, they sell just about everything.

Amazon could have started by trying to solve the big problem: how do we master digital commerce? Instead, they started with a narrow focus and expanded from there. It has been proven many times that this small-to-large approach works well for businesses, and I think it can be very useful for our personal goals as well.

The Idea in Practice

Let's consider a few examples of how we might put this idea into practice.

Creativity. BIG PROBLEM: How do I become more creative?

Small solution: If you want to become a good photographer, then start small. Learn how to take a really good picture of a chair. Once you can take a fantastic picture of a chair, use those principles — light, composition, lines, curves — to take better pictures of everything.

Exercise. BIG PROBLEM: How can I start exercising consistently?

Small solution: If you can't crack the fitness code and struggle to exercise consistently, then forget about every other exercise and just learn how to do one pushup. Use the steps I describe here to increase your number slowly. Stick with that one exercise for days, weeks, months. Once you prove to yourself that you can solve this small problem, use the lessons you learn to become more consistent at exercise in general.

Nutrition. BIG PROBLEM: How can I eat healthy each day?

Small solution: Want to improve your nutrition? Maybe you should ignore switching to a new diet at first. You don't need to change all of your food habits at once. You could start by solving a very small segment of the problem: eat one vegetable today. Master that. Do it for four weeks. Or longer. Take what you learn about being consistent with that one thing and apply it to adding a second healthy food.

Related: This Person Improved Every Tiny Thing by 1 Percent and Here's What Happened

And finally…

Narrowing your focus is a mental model that you can apply whenever you want to start a new behavior or take on a new project that seems too big or overwhelming or complex to handle. It is a filter you can run larger problems through to approach issues from a more useful place.

So, how do you solve big problems? Start with a smaller one.

That three-year-old girl who was diagnosed with leukemia and treated with the drugs that were discovered through the Father of Chemotherapy, Sidney Farber? It was my sister. More than 20 years later, she is alive and well.

I'm very glad Farber decided to start small.

A version of this article first appeared at JamesClear.com. For useful ideas on improving your mental and physical performance, join his free weekly newsletter .

Writer, Entrepreneur and Behavior Science Expert

James Clear is a writer and speaker focused on habits, decision making, and continuous improvement. He is the author of the no. 1  New York Times bestseller, Atomic Habits . The book has sold over 5 million copies worldwide and has been translated into more than 50 languages.

Clear is a regular speaker at Fortune 500 companies and his work has been featured in places like Time magazine, the New York Times , the Wall Street Journal and on CBS This Morning . His popular "3-2-1" email newsletter is sent out each week to more than 1 million subscribers. You can learn more and sign up at  jamesclear.com .

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Six Steps to Solving Big Problems

[email protected]

Today’s article is about problem-solving when things appear to be overwhelming.

16 years ago, I had just made a huge move in my mortgage banking practice. My career started 7 years earlier when I was hired as an assistant to 2 high-level sales people who taught me the ropes and helped me get my life off the ground as a contributing person in the workforce. Before long I was on my own slinging loans in the suburbs of Washington DC for a smaller regional bank. I started making some inroads, built some key relationships, and felt that I was ready to join an organization with a nationwide banking presence, so I made the decision to join Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. My first day was Monday, April 3rd, 2000. I walked in the front door smiling from ear to ear. I was excited. I was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and ready to get after it at my new company.

April 17th. A mere two weeks later would find me sitting behind my desk at 6:30 a.m. with my face in my hands, simply overwhelmed. It was my birthday, but that didn’t really matter with the way I was feeling. I knew (or thought I knew) that I had made the right decision to change companies, but I was overwhelmed by… well, everything. The new company was just so big, and their systems were so different from anything I was familiar with, and their benefits were great but there were so many to choose from, and I had all these clients calling me for loans, but I found myself having no idea how to handle these leads because I had not gotten through all the training yet. I was so overwhelmed and out of my comfort zone, and I felt like I was forgetting all my prior top selling habits. And where were my business cards by the way? And why oh why was I working on my birthday?!

So there I was with my face in my hands, totally overwhelmed and frustrated, when my hiring manager, Mike Evans, walks by with a smile on his face and pokes his head in the door to say, “Good morning.” He took one look at me and knew that something wasn’t right, so he asked me how I was doing. The next 10 minutes are a blur of my verbally vomiting about how awful I was doing and how overwhelmed I was. But about 10 minutes in, he stopped me and said these words that I will never forget: “Jason, big problems have small solutions.”

Boom! That one little sentence hit me like a ton of bricks. I lifted my head out of my hands and listened for the next 15 minutes as he explained to me step-by-step what he meant. These step-by-step instructions have served me well over my career, and as I’ve adapted them over the years, I’ve been able to lead my team and my clients at Rewire to much success, regardless of the specific circumstances that have them feeling overwhelmed.

With the remainder of this article, I’d like to give you an overview of those steps. Just remember: you can solve big problems with small solutions.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 1: MAKE A DECISION TO ACT

Until you make a decision to do something about the problem other than fret about it, nothing happens. We have written about this idea before and it is as true today as it was when Mike helped me 16 years ago. This decision represents a line in the sand for yourself. No decision, no line, no solution. Make a decision to take action.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 2: WRITE OUT THE FACTS AND POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS

This step helps prevent you from going completely emotional on yourself like I was in the story above. To be clear, the problem isn’t emotions themselves; rather it’s when they act like a runaway train and hijack the rational thought processes that we would normally use to figure out solutions. It also helps in getting things out of your head and onto paper . And as long as we are on this topic of writing, my opinion is that you should write these facts out by hand (not typed into a device) because research has shown that when you are writing by hand, your brain is solely focusing on what is at the end of the pen and nothing else. When your brain is this focused, you are giving it power to also focus on possible solutions.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 3: SCHEDULE WHEN YOU WILL BEGIN “SOLUTIONING” THE PROBLEM

This step gives your solutions a time-frame and takes them from being a pipe dream in your head to actually happening in reality at a specific place and at a certain time. Specificity is a key in getting things done. Ambiguity is not. So get in on your hourly calendar.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 4: START

We have written many articles on the power of starting something . Starting something, even when it’s not a great or perfect start, gets the momentum going and gets you that much closer to a solution. There’s an old adage that it’s easier to steer a moving car than a stationary one. And this idea definitely applies here: no start, no solution.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 5: MEASURE ALONG THE WAY

What gets measured gets done. As my friend Tony Horton asks in the P90x video series, “how do you know where you’re going unless you track where you’ve been?” It is much easier knowing what kind of progress you are making towards your solution when you are measuring along the way and either celebrating the path to the solution or making adjustments along that path.

PROBLEM-SOLVING STEP 6: MAKE ADJUSTMENTS

If you notice in your measurements from step 5 that you are veering off course, this step ensures you make the necessary course corrections and continue on the path towards the solutions.

• how to make more sales,
• losing 100 pounds,
• rewiring your brain to actually enjoy nutritious foods,
• building a better relationship with your spouse,
• developing a new technology,
• or, like in my case above, being overwhelmed by starting at a new company.

I’ll close this article by saying that these 6 steps really do work. After my manager gave me “the talk” I described above, I went on to becoming one of Wells Fargo’s (and the nation’s) top mortgage bankers for several years running by using the “big problems have small solutions” system repeatedly. So I know it will work for you too. Give them a try and let us know how it goes.

P.S. If you’d like to read more about this idea, I’d highly recommend Chip and Dan Heath’s Switch: How to change when change is hard . They talk more in-depth about the mental block I faced in this article. The block is that we assume that “big” problems require equally big or complex solutions. But as my colleague Mike shared, this isn’t the case.

Speaking of Mike, I’d like to give a public thanks to Mike Evans for stepping in and getting me off the dime in April of 2000 (and helping the many who came after me with the same type of advice).

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To Solve Big Problems, Look for Small Wins

• Bill Taylor

Especially as you’re thinking about the “next normal” after Covid-19.

So much of the expert commentary on Covid-19 argues, as did a recent white paper from McKinsey & Company, that we are on the brink of a “next normal” that will “witness a dramatic restructuring of the economic and social order in which business and society have traditionally operated.” The author argues that the best way for leaders to face this “next normal” is to embrace a gradual, improvisational, quietly persistent approach to change that Karl E. Weick, the organizational theorist and distinguished professor at the University of Michigan, famously called “small wins.” It’s when things get really bad that small wins become especially vital. And change initiatives built on small wins have another virtue: When things go bad, as they often do, failure leads to modest disappointments rather than catastrophic setbacks.

In these difficult times, we’ve made a number of our coronavirus articles free for all readers. To get all of HBR’s content delivered to your inbox, sign up for the Daily Alert newsletter.

It is tempting, during a crisis as severe as the Covid-19 pandemic, for leaders to respond to big problems with bold moves — a radical strategy to reinvent a struggling business, a long-term shift to virtual teams and long-distance collaboration. Indeed, so much of the expert commentary on Covid-19 argues, as did a recent white paper from McKinsey & Company , that we are on the brink of a “next normal” that will “witness a dramatic restructuring of the economic and social order in which business and society have traditionally operated.”

I’d argue that even if we do face a “next normal,” the best way for leaders to move forward isn’t by making sweeping changes but rather by embracing a gradual, improvisational, quietly persistent approach to change that Karl E. Weick, the organizational theorist and distinguished professor at the University of Michigan, famously called “small wins.” Weick is an intellectual giant; over the past 50 years, his concepts such as loose coupling, mindfulness, and sensemaking have shaped our understanding of organizational life. But perhaps his most powerful insight into to how we can navigate treacherous times is to remind us that when it comes to leading change, less is usually more.

In a classic paper published in 1984 , Weick bemoaned the failure of social scientists like himself to understand and solve social problems. “The massive scale on which social problems are conceived often precludes innovation action,” he warned. “People often define social problems in ways that overwhelm their ability to do anything about them.” Ironically, he concludes, “people can’t solve problems unless they think they aren’t problems.”

Further Reading

Coronavirus: Leadership and Recovery

Hence the power of small wins. Many scholars have drawn on Weick’s insights as they’ve developed their own arguments about the best ways to work, lead, and make change. Perhaps most notably, nearly a decade ago, in their influential book The Progress Principle , Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer showed how small wins could “ignite joy, engagement, and creativity at work.” As they explained, “even events that people thought were unimportant had powerful effects on inner work life.”

But it’s when things get really bad that small wins become especially vital. Weick defines a small win as “a concrete, complete, implemented outcome of moderate importance.” On its own, one small win (say, restaurants that sell groceries as well as take-out meals , or town clerks in New York State who marry people over videoconference ) “may seem unimportant,” he concedes. But “a series of wins” begins to reveal “a pattern that may attract allies, deter opponents, and lower resistance to subsequent proposals.” Small wins “are compact, tangible, upbeat, [and] noncontroversial.” Moreover, since “small wins are dispersed, they are harder to find and attack than is one big win that is noticed by everyone…who defines the world as a zero-sum game.”

Today, Weick’s paper is considered a landmark, not just because of its counter-intuitive strategies on how to improve society and organizations, but because those strategies are built on deep insights into human psychology. (The paper was published in a journal called American Psychologist .) “When the magnitude of problems is scaled upward in the interest of mobilizing action,” he argues, “the quality of thought and action declines, because processes such as frustration, arousal, and helplessness are activated.” The challenge for people and teams, Weick explains, is managing the tension between “stress” and “hardiness.”

Any effort to change a company or improve a community creates stress, a certain amount of which leads to commitment, action, and what Weick calls “arousal.” But too much of anything is a bad thing: “Highly aroused people find it difficult to learn a novel response, to brainstorm, to concentrate, to resist old categories.” But just the right level of stress, Weick went on, the level of stress generated by the search for small wins, creates a psychological hardiness that allows leaders and their allies to draw on “imagination, knowledge, skill, and choice.”

Donald Berwick, cofounder of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), and one of the world’s most foremost authorities on making positive change in a notoriously complex field, has his own twist on Weick’s insights about stress and hardiness. The job for change agents in healthcare, he has said , is to “electrify” their colleagues while being careful not to “electrocute” them — that is, to charge them up about moving forward without short-circuiting their resolve in the face of setbacks and disappointments.

Bing Gordon, the renowned video-game developer and venture capitalist, has made the same argument about big technology challenges. He calls it “ smallifying .” At Electronic Arts, where Gordon was chief creative officer, teams that worked on complex, long-term projects “were inefficient and took unnecessary paths,” explained Peter Sims in his book , Little Bets . “However, when tasks were broken down into particular problems to be solved, which were manageable and could be tackled within one or two weeks, developers were more creative and effective.”

Change initiatives built on small wins have another virtue: When things go bad, as they often do, failure leads to modest disappointments rather than catastrophic setbacks. In a paper published eight years after Weick’s case for the power of small wins, and in an obvious nod to that work, Sim B. Sitkin, a professor at Duke University, made the case for a “ strategy of small losses .” The problem for leaders who think too big and aim to move too quickly, Sitkin argued, is that their rank-and-file colleagues also see the possibility of missteps and mistakes, and understand the stakes when things go wrong. So people often fail to act, rather than act and fail, since they are less likely to suffer the consequences of bold moves they did not take.

There is “an inherent risk asymmetry” in organizations and societies, Sitkin argues. “Problems that result from taking risks often lead to punishment,” whereas “problems that result from the avoidance of risky action are rarely traced to individuals and less often lead to punishment.” A more sustainable model of change, Sitkin argues, is to embrace opportunities for “intelligent failures” — missteps and mistakes that provide “small doses of experience to discover uncertainties unpredictable in advance.”

This is by no means an argument against passion, commitment, or intensity — the emotions that move people and fuel innovation. As John Gardner, the Stanford University scholar of leadership and change, has written, “The renewal of societies and organizations can go forward only if someone cares. Apathetic men and women accomplish nothing. Those who believe in nothing change nothing for the better.”

But there is a difference between caring deeply and moving recklessly, between facing up to dire problems and taking unwise risks. Amidst this big crisis, leaders should give themselves permission to focus on the power of small wins.

If our content helps you to contend with coronavirus and other challenges, please consider subscribing to HBR . A subscription purchase is the best way to support the creation of these resources.

• Bill Taylor  is the cofounder of Fast Company  and the author, most recently, of  Simply Brilliant: How Great Organizations Do Ordinary Things in Extraordinary Ways .   Learn more at williamctaylor.com.

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How to Solve the Biggest Problems with Problem Solving Skills

By Shane Chagpar , Kepner-Tregoe

• Issue Resolution Solve complex work issues with KT's analytical tools. Learn More

What makes a problem a “big” problem?

Urgency : Perhaps, time is working against you and the problem is impacting a critical business deadline or the problem has been occurring for an extended period, creating an escalated time sensitivity. Some level of urgency can help to motivate problem-solving teams, but beware of the risk of applying undue stress to an already tense situation.

Perception : Maintaining customers, shareholders and employees’ positive perceptions of your business is more critical than ever in the present social media-driven culture. Problems that impact their perceptions of your company can be devastating, and must be managed carefully.

Complexity : Big problems are rarely simple to understand and solve – if they were, then they would be resolved already and would no longer be a problem. Complexity can slow resolution time and generate anxiety amongst stakeholders.

The unknown : Big problems often involve a large number of assumptions, opinions, projections and subjective decision making that lead to a high degree of uncertainty in both overall success and comparative benefits of proposed resolutions. This uncertainty translates into risk for your company that must be understood and managed.

Resource scarcity : Assigning the right people and applying the right resources to solving a problem can often be challenging. In most organizations, the most qualified resources are already fully allocated to other critical business activities, resulting in either a prioritization trade-off for their time or the use of less qualified resources to assist in solving the problem. Resource scarcity can lead to delays in solving the problem as well as the potential for increased risk.

Impact on your business or customers : Sometimes a problem is a “big problem” because of the impact it has on your business operations (a work stoppage or quality issue) or to your customers (missed delivery timelines, cost overruns or failed delivery expectations). Problems with direct quantifiable impact often come with increased management oversight and scrutiny to the problem-solving team and process.

Want to develop your problem solving skills? Start here . 

Problem-solving skills help you…

Distinguish between perception and reality: Managing perception is important, but during the problem-solving process, it is important to understand the difference between perception (which is often a distraction or “noise”) and reality (which can help you understand the situation). Filtering the noise and strengthening the actual signals related to the problem are important skills that good problem-solving teams should develop.

Separate the symptoms from the causes: One of the most fundamental skills of problem solving is understanding the difference between symptoms (effects) and the causes that generate them. Most big problems involve a series of cause-and-effect relationships that the problem-solving team must understand to ensure that its members know the root-cause of the problem and apply a fix at the appropriate place for maximum effect.

Dissect complexity: Structured problem-solving methods can help a team dissect a complex problem into manageable parts as well as identify solutions that are actionable by the organization.

Validate unknowns: Uncertainty is a natural part of the problem-solving process. By taking a methodical approach to identify unknowns and areas of ambiguity and systematically validate them, the team can avoid the dangerous pitfall of developing solutions based entirely on assumption.

Make progress with the resources you have: Strong problem-solving skills and solid processes can help a team overcome gaps in subject-matter expertise and a scarcity of resources. This is accomplished by focusing activities and solutions on areas that are actionable with the resources available and avoiding “resource roadblocks.”

Minimize (or maximize) impact: Not all impact is bad; in fact, sometimes problems can be translated into opportunities for your company or customers. Problems often reveal previously unknown information about your operations and environment that can have either positive or negative impacts on your business. Identifying this information quickly and translating it into actionable insights is an important part of the problem-solving process.

Transform a big problem into a manageable problem (or a set of smaller problems): Sometimes, the best way to address a big problem is to separate it into smaller, more manageable parts. Strong problem-solving skills can help your team understand when this technique is appropriate versus when it will just create an additional layer of complexity to the situation.

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How to solve a big problem (even if you don’t know how)

Take the humble screwdriver. A simple, common-or-garden-variety flat screwdriver. It seems like such a simple tool, but it can actually be used for a hundred different things. You can open paint cans, poke holes in drywall, use the back end as a makeshift hammer, pry open a stuck window, an icepick, a gardening tool, to get the mud off your shoes, a back scratcher, … And, of course, you can use it to drive or loosen flat-head (also called slotted) screws.

We're all a bit like a flat-head screwdriver. We can do a lot of stuff, but we don't realise that we can until we're put in a situation where the only tool we have is, well, a screwdriver (or ourselves).

I don't know how to do this!

When we're building a business, there's a lot of stuff we know we can't do. We may be good at some stuff (for example, writing code or training future leaders) but we don't know how to create marketing material. Or we may not know how to sell.

When we run into these roadblocks, we stop. We may ask our friend Google, or we may ask an expert. We find out that it's going to take a lot of money to do something, or a lot of time or (usually) a bit of both.

We instinctively know that we can outsource some stuff (for example, creating marketing material) but other stuff, like sales, we have to learn to do ourselves. So we look for a marketer or someone who can train us.

But the truth is that even for stuff we know we can outsource, we actually know how to do some of it. We just have to break it down into smaller parts.

This is called deconstructing the problem.

Just about every complex thing can be broken down into smaller, less complex parts.

Example: building a website

You may feel that you don't know the first thing about building a website. But you actually know how to do some of it. Let's break this one problem (build a website) down into smaller parts - it may look something like this:

• Determine what you want the website to do for you (advertise your products or services, establish your authority, generate leads, and so on).
• Decide what you want the front page to do (get people to buy stuff, segment your audience, get them to download a lead magnet, etc).
• Decide what other pages you need. An "about" page? A contact page? A list of products, or events?
• Do you want a header or footer that looks the same on all pages? What would it contain?

So, you've already broken the "build a website" problem into smaller problems. You can now take each of these smaller problems and break them down into even smaller problems.

Take the front page of your website. You can break this down into smaller problems too:

• What's the first thing I want people to see?
• What do I want people to do?
• What are they looking for?
• How do I tell them what's important to know about me and/or my products or services?

You're getting the drift of how this works. You've taken one problem (build a website for my business) and broken it down into smaller problems. Then you've taken each of the smaller problems and broken them down into even smaller problems.

This process is called the art of deconstruction.

The art of deconstruction

The art of deconstruction is the process of taking any problem and breaking it down into a set of smaller problems. If you can solve all of the smaller problems you will have solved the big problem. And if any of the smaller problems are still too big to solve, you can repeat the process and break it down into even smaller problems.

Mind maps are great tools for breaking big problems down into smaller problems. Here's the start of a mind map for the "build a website" problem:

You can stop the process of deconstruction when:

• you know how to solve each of the smaller problems (and therefore the ig problem); or
• you don't know how to break it down any further.

In practice, you will find that you can actually solve a lot more than you originally thought. You will also need to run through the breakdown a couple of times to answer the question: is this everything I need to solve the big problem? Run through the deconstruction a couple of times until you're satisfied you can solve the big problem, or you've reached a point where you know how to solve some of the smaller problems but not others. Then you can decide what to do about it.

Deconstructing marketing and sales collateral

Let's take another example (one suggested by a friend of mine). A business needs to create marketing and sales collateral for their business. When we think marketing and sales collateral, we think of a web site, brochures, product sheets, and so on.

Let's deconstruct this problem into smaller problems.

Marketing and sales is a process that starts with creating awareness and progressing all the way through to making a sale. In the Tornado Method we break this down into 5 stages called the Revenue Engine:

The "big" problem here is "we need marketing and sales collateral". The first step in breaking the problem down is to ask "what marketing and sales collateral do we need in each of the 5 stages of the Revenue Engine?"

Now we can look at each stage individually, and the first thing that makes life a lot easier is when we realise we only need marketing and sales collateral for the first three stages of the Revenue Engine: marketing, lead nurturing and sales.

We can now look at what marketing (or sales) collateral in each stage. We may come up with something like this:

• Marketing: web site
• Lead nurturing: lead magnet, case studies.
• Sales: product brochures, pricing sheet.

We've already taken one big problem (we need marketing and sales collateral) and broken it down into 5 smaller problems (a web site, lead magnet, case studies, product brochures and a pricing sheet).

Each one of these problems can now be broken down further into smaller problems. For each of the pieces of collateral, we need to decide:

• who is the audience?
• what do they know when they get to see each particular piece of collateral?
• what do we want them to know when they've read through it?
• what is in the collateral (the content)?
• what will it look like (how do we make it attractive and usable)?
• what do we want potential clients to do when they've read it?

You can now solve each of these problems, or at least some of them and outsource the others.

Where deconstruction fails

There are two big things that happen when we deconstruct a problem:

• by making the problem smaller, it becomes easier to deal with it; and
• instead of worrying about a big problem (and not making any progress) we can actually start solving some of the smaller problems.

Of course, we still have to deal with the smaller problems we don't know how to solve. In the case of marketing and sales collateral, we may still have to get someone to write the final copy (or edit what we produced) and make it pretty. But that's a lot smaller problem to solve.

But deconstruction can fail because we don't know what we don't know. For example, we may not know that to create good marketing and sales material requires that we also understand our target client very well. And that we have to capture that in a marketing persona, or avatar.

Don't let this lack of knowledge stop you. You're going to be at least 80% right most of the time, and the gaps can be filled in by the experts when you call them in. One word of advice: call them in sooner rather than later. Expert advice from the outside will help you do better deconstruction and make their life easier when you do ask them to do their bits.

Summary (and another example)

We can solve big problems by breaking them down into smaller problems. This is called the art of deconstruction .

You can stop deconstructing a problem when you know how to solve all the smaller problems, or when you've reached a point where you don't know how to deconstruct a problem any more.

You're going to find that you actually know how to solve more parts of a problem that you thought when you started out.

Don't let a lack of knowledges stop you from deconstructing a problem. You're going to be 80% right most of the time, and expert advice will help you get where you need to be a lot faster than you thought possible.

Here's a last example.

I'm building a self-study course titled The Lifestyle Business Foundation Course . The course is designed to help entrepreneurs build a solid foundation for a business that will give them the lifestyle they want. Apart from the lifestyle angle, this is nothing short of a course on how to build a business, and that can be a monumental task to put into a course.

So I broke the course down into smaller problems, and the smaller problems into even smaller ones, and so on. Here's what the top level of the course looks like:

Building this course is still a monumental task (or a labour of love, as I call it). But it's made a lot easier because I'm only focusing on one part of the course at a time, and within that part on one topic. By the time I've completed all of the topics I will have a course.

Yet another use for a screwdriver

You can also use a screwdriver to cook hot dogs over a campfire. I recommend you use a long one, and that you clean it thoroughly before you do. And don't tell your mom - she won't be impressed.

Next time you're stuck with a problem, start deconstructing it. You may find you can use a screwdriver to solve at least some of the smaller problems.

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SOLVE PROBLEMS THAT MATTER

By Ryan Allis, CEO of Hive

Too many people are putting their lives into building something they just aren’t that passionate about and that doesn’t actually make the world a better place.

Both Max Marmer in the 2012 Harvard Business Review article “ Transformational Entrepreneurship ” and C.Z. Nnaemeka in the 2013 MIT Entrepreneurship Review article “ The Unexotic Underclass ” have lamented the lack of startups striving to solve the big problems. Don’t build a silly app that takes sepia-toned photos of cats or an app for sending photos that disappear after 10 seconds.

If you’re going to go through the hell of building a startup, you might as well come out the other side having built something that actually made a difference in the world and solved a big problem. Yes, you can start hacking at solving a big problem by solving little problems… but always keep the end goal in mind.

Dropbox co-founder Drew Houston shared in his 2013 MIT Commencement address, “The happiest and most successful people I know don’t just love what they do, they’re obsessed with solving an important problem, something that matters to them. They remind me of a dog chasing a tennis ball: their eyes go a little crazy, the leash snaps and they go bounding off, plowing through whatever gets in the way.”

Fortunately, it’s actually a lot easier to work intensely on solving a problem you are really passionate about. Taking the time to find out what problems in the world you are passionate about solving is the key. In my view, life is just too short to build things that don’t make the world better.

Thomas Edison once explained his approach to innovation succinctly:

“I find out what the world needs. Then, I go ahead and invent it.”

The most successful businesses tend to be born out of that sweet spot where what the world needs intersects with what you are deeply passionate about. If you don’t know what your personal mission is—what change you want to create in the world—start there. 

You should find a problem that matters to you so much that you can go after with such intensity of focus and passion that you look like a rambunctious dog chasing after a tennis ball, unable to even think about anything else for months at a time.

Big Problems = Big Opportunities

“I don’t skate to where the puck is. I skate to where the puck is going.” –Wayne Gretzky

If you want to build a really big business you have to solve a really big problem. Here are some areas that contain both big problems and big opportunities. Some of them are already pressing issues, others are just appearing on the horizon. These issues need courageous and inspired business leaders to build scalable solutions that can impact billions of people. If one of these areas aligns with what you care about, you could have the chance to make a big difference. Here are some areas that contain many of the biggest opportunities of 2015-2035.

Challenge yourself to think bigger and challenge yourself to build a company that matters in the world and solves major human problems. That’s how you become a billionaire while making major impact. And if you’re not familiar with the above topic areas, take the Singularity University Executive Program  in Mountain View, CA, or go on The Great Courses and watch  this future of science and technology course from Jeffrey Grossman . These were the two courses I took in Summer 2012 that greatly increased my understanding of the latest opportunities to build companies that are commercializing science and solving major human problems.

Build a Business That Actually Aligns With Your Life Purpose

Before you begin a new business or find a new problem to solve, take the time to write down your life purpose. Think about the change you seek to create in the world, and then start a company to make that change real. Ask yourself these three questions:

What are the big problems I see in the world? Which one am I most passionate about solving? How can I create a business that solves that problem, creates value some people are willing to pay for, and makes the world better?

Don’t make the mistake of building a company if you’re not deeply passionate about the problem you are trying to solve. Too many startups try to solve problems they’re not passionate about solving—and they burn out because they don’t have the source of inspiration and energy to carry them through the tough times. Knowing that your business mission is aligned with your personal life mission can help immeasurably to keep you on course and give you the resilience to weather the storms that are sure to come. Once you know who you want to become, you can direct your life rather than letting outside factors control you. Here’s my life purpose:

To build and invest in companies which use technology and design to solve major human challenges.

Finding this core motivation at age 18 has been critical to getting me through the difficult and challenging times. It’s helped me to find the strength from within to persevere in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. In line with my life mission, I’m now building a company called Connect to make it easier for people to communicate with each other around the world. We hope to become the leader in social mapping, and we know we have a lot of hard work ahead. What you do, don’t make the mistake of building a company if you’re not deeply passionate about the problem you are trying to solve. Too many startups build crappy applications that don’t make the world better or try to solve problems they’re just not passionate about solving—and they burn out because they don’t have the source of inspiration and energy to carry them through the tough times. Knowing that your business mission is aligned with your personal life mission can help immeasurably to keep you on course and give you the resilience to weather the storms that are sure to come.

If You Need To, Start Small . . . But Stay Aligned

If the scale of the problems I just listed intimidates you, start smaller. Pick a small problem that you feel ready to tackle—but don’t forget your overriding motivation and mission. If you can start with a small problem that is aligned with your greater mission, it can act as a confidence-builder and a stepping stone to the bigger problems you care about solving. Let who you are and what you believe in come out in all that you create. You’re trading your life in order to bring what your startup builds to the world. What you build is truly your gift to the world. Make your gift awesome.

Slides on Choosing Your Problem

• HIVE RALEIGH

OUR MISSION: BUILD THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY FOR PURPOSE-DRIVEN LEADERS