Explore the problem 1st not the solution

During a project meeting an interesting thing happened. This particular project has been in the review stage for a while. The main navigation for this online learning module is built around a map of the small town. Repeatedly we have have received feedback from the client that “The map needs to be bigger on our screens, it’s really small compared to your screens” We have repeatedly checked the size on different screens. It‘s responsive so the size of the graphics does change depending on the browser window.

In the meeting I paused for moment and asked “What is the problem with the size?” and the client responded with “the buildings are too small we cannot figure out what they are”. When we looked at the map I realised some of the buildings had signage that was hard to read. Now we could see that it wasn’t the map that needed to be bigger but the illustrations of the buildings and signage within the map.

We were all focusing on the solution (resizing the image) and not the problem (the buildings/signage on buildings were too small). When we started to talk about the problem instead of hearing the problem and then focusing on one solution we found the right solution

For me it highlighted the importance of exploring the problem thoroughly first before jumping to the solutions.