HOW THIS BOOK WILL HELP YOU

There are hundreds of books on problem-solving. Most of these focus on solving simple problems, or provide a step-by-step problem-solving method that the authors hope will help you progress on harder problems, like following a recipe.

When cooking an easy dish or solving an easy problem, a very specific step-by-step guide that you can robotically follow can lead you to victory, like with boiling an egg. But you’ll notice that you can’t take a totally untrained cook, hand them a recipe for a complicated gourmet dish, and expect it to come out very good. Great chefs demonstrate behaviors that set them apart from other cooks, allowing them to consistently create complex, novel dishes—even dishes others have never thought of before.

Great problem-solvers possess a specific set of behaviors that they apply to solve the hardest problems—the kinds others call “impossible” or have simply accepted as an unchangeable force of nature.

This book will help you understand the behaviors that great problem-solvers use to tackle the hardest problems with skill and panache, regardless of the industry or nature of the problem. These behaviors are universal and will help you to skillfully use whatever problem-solving methods you happen to know.