{"id":508,"date":"2011-05-16T12:24:19","date_gmt":"2011-05-16T16:24:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/?p=508"},"modified":"2020-01-21T18:10:45","modified_gmt":"2020-01-21T22:10:45","slug":"5-step-problem-solving-process","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/2011\/05\/16\/5-step-problem-solving-process\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Steps to Finding the Ideal Solution"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>May 16th through\u00a0the 20th is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsmallbusinessweek.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">National Small Business Week<\/a>.<\/strong><br \/>\nIt&#8217;s an opportunity to honor the spirit of the entrepreneur and thank them for the benefits growing businesses bestow upon our economy and community &#8211; job creation and poverty reduction.\u00a0This year I thought it would be nice to not only thank them but also provide a helpful business best practice.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000\"><strong>Reap What You <del>Sow<\/del> Know<\/strong><\/span><br \/>\nBusiness owners, and for those aspiring to become entrepreneurs, your ability to achieve the ultimate reward \u2013 doing good while doing well \u2013 hinges on how well you solve problems for your customers.<\/p>\n<p>The following 5 step problem-solving methodology produces substantial benefits:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Identifying the correct problem<\/strong>. This is the linchpin to everything else. Unfortunately, it\u2019s not as simple as one might think. Ask the right people a lot of questions about what the problem really is, instead of guessing and making a snap decision.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Get creative<\/strong>. Brainstorm possible solutions, the best ideas are generated when you have the opportunity to bounce them off others.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Evaluate<\/strong>. The pecking order of choice is 1)\u00a0the impact on the goal, 2)\u00a0the level of complexity (time &amp; money), and 3)\u00a0measurability.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Execute.<\/strong> Take action. One would be surprised at how often this step is skipped. This is why Nike\u2019s slogan of \u2018Just Do It\u2019 is so strong.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Validate<\/strong>. Did the assumptions hold true.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Bonus: Learn how to and when to <strong>pivot<\/strong> (deciding what to change and then take action to reconfigure some part(s) of the solution)<\/p>\n<p>Is it worth the effort? Absolutely, the payoff for executing is a profitable, successful, and focused entity with satisfied customers. And that is your goal isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"570\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/2011\/05\/16\/5-step-problem-solving-process\/students\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/files\/2011\/05\/students.jpg?fit=576%2C555&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"576,555\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1304695257&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"students\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/files\/2011\/05\/students.jpg?fit=576%2C555&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"size-full wp-image-570 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/files\/2011\/05\/students.jpg?resize=238%2C230\" alt=\"\" width=\"238\" height=\"230\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/files\/2011\/05\/students.jpg?w=576&amp;ssl=1 576w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/files\/2011\/05\/students.jpg?resize=500%2C481&amp;ssl=1 500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 238px) 100vw, 238px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Donald McMichael teaches <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fitnyc.edu\/3131.asp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">BE 261: Starting a Small Business<\/a>. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>May 16th through\u00a0the 20th is National Small Business Week. It&#8217;s an opportunity to honor the spirit of the entrepreneur and thank them for the benefits growing businesses bestow upon our economy and community &#8211; job creation and poverty reduction.\u00a0This year I thought it would be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":226,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"post-templates\/post-middle-column.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8577],"tags":[8582,8576,38568],"class_list":["post-508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-small-business","tag-business-tips","tag-entrepreneurs","tag-small-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1v7EM-8c","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/226"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=508"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/hottopicsinsider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}