Problem Solving In The Real World

From about 5 years old to somewhere between 18 and 30 years old, we’re asked to solve problems in some specific way in order to demonstrate we understand what the professor was paid to teach us. You’re allowed to use this method, but not that one. You’re allowed to employ these techniques, but not these shortcuts. Your answer must be written, and fit within this many pages.

Because this idea of approaching problems within a set of constraints gets hammered into our brains, most people carry on thinking this way for the rest of their lives. This is the way this problem is dealt with, so that’s how I’m going to deal with it. This tool is what the last guy used to solve this problem, so this is the tool to use to solve this problem.

Many times this approach will suffice. But that doesn’t mean its the best approach, or the easiest, or the cheapest, or the optimal approach. We should remember that the arbitrary constraints that apply to problem solving in the academic world usually don’t apply in the real world. And just because others in the industry have imposed such constraints, because they’ve become “industry standards”, doesn’t mean you have to work within them.

For example, in California, there is nothing in the law that says you can’t include diagrams or pictures in a legal brief. Millions of words could have been spared with the use of a picture, or a chart, or a drawing, but they are exceedingly rare (I have never actually seen one used). But none of that means you can’t use a picture. And, when a drawing was the easiest way to convey the information we needed to convey, that’s what we did.

The more academia we’re exposed to, the more indoctrinated we get into this idea that there is a certain way things are done, and thus we must do certain things that way. Rarely is this actually the case.