The Thing on Asking Questions, & Problem Solving

2 Frameworks you can use today!

Apr 08, 2023

This Issue at a Glance…

You’ll learn how to:

Break down a complex problem into basic truths.
Ask questions to fill in gaps in knowledge.
Create actionable solutions to solve the problem using Abstract Laddering & 1st Principles Framework.

I’ll start with a personal story where I walk through a problem-solving framework, asking questions, and devising solutions.

Building Context:

Summer after my 1st year in college, I got a job as an undergraduate researcher.

My first project on the job:

Design a Prototype using Soft Magnetic-Responsive Materials to improve the accuracy of Medical Intubation in 1 month.

Great. A clear problem statement except:

No idea how to design a prototype for a client. (I’m a 1st year engineering student, I don’t know how to build anything beyond a cube or ring in CAD)
What’s soft magnetic responsive materials are or how to make them.
What’s medical intubation?

And I had 1 month to build a prototype. I didn’t want to bother my lab mates (who were PHD & post-doc students) with pointless questions, so

What type of questions do you ask to not waste time?
How do you break down a complex problem?
How do you research?

These are all skills you don’t learn in university as an engineering student but are 90% of the job.

Here’s how I tackled the problem, did the research, and built the prototype in 1 month (and impressed my boss):

Problem Statement: Design a Prototype using Soft Magnetic-Responsive Materials to improve the accuracy of Medical Intubation in 1 month.

Let’s focus on 3 sections.

Research:

The quickest antidote to fear is a dose of facts.

I gave myself 2 days to gather as much information as possible on medical intubation and magnetic responsive materials. I focused on academic papers and videos. To filter content, you need a system.

I created 1 goal: Each resource must give background info on the topic of medical intubation or soft robotics.

With academic papers, I read the abstract & conclusion then threw it into a database to read later. I leaned on co-workers for guidance on where to look. try to avoid too complex or high-level papers, focus on clear applications to get a footing.

After the 2 days, I dive into the papers and start asking questions.

Asking Questions:

When asking questions, your best friend is doubt.

When reading any resource, note any word, concept, name, or idea you don’t recognize.

Soon, you’ll have a database of what you don’t know. Do this for 2-3 resources. Go down the list of what you don’t know and find the answers. It won’t take long until you see connections. This will be a cycle and you should spend 3-4 days doing this.

Getting a foundation is important. No solution is better than a poor, ineffective solution.

Devise Questions.
Research Answers.
Note the unfamiliar.
Repeat.

Framework to use to help ask questions: Abstraction Laddering

Focus on writing “why” and “how” questions.

Each “why” questions you go up a rung to get a higher-level view.

Each “how” questions you go down a rung to get a deeper understanding.

Abstraction laddering

Frame your problem better with different levels of abstraction.

untools.co/abstraction-laddering

Devising Solutions:

Solutions are as good as the metrics used to measure their success.

As you research & ask questions, you will develop solutions on your own. This is good, but don’t implement solutions until you have these 2 metrics: “done” & “success”.

The “Done” metrics:

Before you start working on a solution, you need to know when to stop & why you are choosing this solution.

It might sound dumb, but it is super easy to get stuck in a rut of creating & adding on features which don’t help the client. You need a metric of what is considered “done” for the solution.

Do you need certain features? Does your solution need to perform to a certain standard?