Winning the Brain Game

Solving Problems

In 2005, author Matthew E. May worked with 12 bomb technicians from the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) to help them prepare for new forms of terrorism. The approaches the LAPD once used to counter terrorism had stopped working well because the nature of terrorism had changed: Modern terrorists often function without leaders and act unpredictably.

The LAPD’s bomb technicians saw themselves as skilled in solving problems. They believed they learned quickly. May invited them to see themselves as innovators. He taught them that various approaches to perceiving a problem in a new light and then solving it have certain things in common. These processes follow a structured pattern of “questioning, framing, hypothesizing, ideating, testing” and “reflecting.”

May presented the technicians with a business problem he had previously offered to similar groups. He thought the bomb technicians would repeat the solutions other people had attempted that failed to solve the problem. Then he asked the technicians to see themselves as the owners of a fancy health club. As a perk, the club provides a bottle of popular, expensive shampoo in ...