

The Problem with Problems - veb
http://000fff.org/the-problem-with-problems/

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jasode
Another trigger for tech companies is "curiosity" instead of deliberate
"problem-solving".

The software or hardware engineer "tinkers" with something simple. And then, a
lightbulb goes off and the "toy" looks like it is well-suited to solving a
particular problem.

Larry Page wasn't looking to solve a "problem of inefficient advertising
expenses." He was satisfying an intellectual curiosity about applying the
citations (e.g. Erdos #) in research papers to web pages. (One could argue
that you could reformulate "The Problem" to be " _retrieve more relevant
weblinks than AltaVista_ " but for my example, I refer instead to the "ad
dollars problem" because that's the one that pays Google's bills.)

Maybe it depends on the person. One type of person sees a "problem", then
he/she deconstructs that into components and try to make a viable business.
That's definitely where a lot of B2B businesses get started.

Another type of person simply tinkers and experiments and "solves problems" as
a side effect.

~~~
ThomPete
Thats a very good point and I guess that sometimes you have a combination of
someone who understands a problem and know off someone else who came up with
something (maybe even from another field) and combine the two for a solution.
I think there are plenty of examples of that although I can't remember anyone
right now.

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zaphar
While not directly the point of his article I found the example of time
tracking to perfectly line up with my experience.

The hidden problem exists because there is a disconnect between the people who
fill out those timesheets and the people who consume them.

The people who fill them out can't use the data. As a result the data is
almost never correct and is largely useless and the people who consume them
are picking out the wrong patterns from bad data.

The only reliable unit of measurement for time tracking is days spent.
Anything else is measuring a largely made up number.

Further more they feed this idea that cramming at the end of a project is a
good way shorten the time. Since you are tracking hours not days it's a short
step to just upping the hours without upping the days as a short cut. But none
of these apps give any data on the quality of those hours spent.

~~~
ThomPete
Author here.

Exactly and and so if people aren't aware of this it will just be considered
annoying but just the way things are.

~~~
mgrennan
This is where passion for the work is a mark for quality. A person who loves
what they are doing works long hours from the start and is never done because
they always can make it better.

~~~
zaphar
That isn't the mark of a person who loves what they do. It's the mark of a
person with an unhealthy obsession. Working long hours is neither necessary
for a quality product nor healthy long term.

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mgrennan
I have proof this is true. I have 35+ years experience in micro data
processing. I have mentored several young people and seen them rocket to the
top. I understand it is our nature to push away from parents to strike out on
our own. I also understand why older people resist change. Magic happens when
the young seek to understand the wisdom of their elders and elders hold on to
explorer spirit of their youth.

~~~
ThomPete
You sir, just made my day.

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michaelbuckbee
I'd cast it more as looking for inefficient processes than as outright
"problems" as most people who are not developers and doing their day to day
jobs don't even perceive things as an issue so much as just how things are.

I've developed a few small software things that have saved people hours a
week.

For example, I built a free tool [1] that lets you export a tagged subset of
bookmarks from Pinboard into a nice format for inclusion in a webpage or
Mailchimp newsletter. The person who I built this for wasn't really
complaining about "gee, it takes me a couple hours to collect all these links,
format them, etc." but when I saw their process, sheesh.

1 -
[http://www.bigbadassresourcelist.com](http://www.bigbadassresourcelist.com)

~~~
timdavila
Neat tool! It would be nice to see some examples of the result somewhere on
your site.

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tempodox
I realised long ago that the problematic quality of a problem stems solely
from the perception that it represents a problem at all. If you consequently
refuse to cast a situation as a problem, it ceases to be one.

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nine_k
The key takeaway:

«It is my guess that there is a potential goldmine of problems we simply don’t
know of because the people who are exposed to them aren’t connected with the
people who have the opportunity and willingness to solve them. … Perhaps the
real power of diversity in business isn’t hidden in gender but in age»

~~~
ThomPete
Yes.

I thought I wanted to take people through the thought process and the things I
did to get there. Not sure if it worked, but it allowed me to get my thoughts
down on paper.

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beat
This touches on so many things I've been saying...

I describe really interesting problems as "fish don't know they live in
water". The people who have the problem and deal with it every day don't even
recognize that it's a solvable or that pain reduction is possible.

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jackgavigan
_> “Are the older and younger generations wildly underutilizing each other as
resource?”_

I actually think that the older generation is far better at utilizing the
younger, than vice versa.

~~~
ThomPete
Perhaps, but the young just have the upper hand in todays market. They don't
even have to solve real problems and still people are throwing money after
them.

~~~
jackgavigan
Yes but the ones who figure out how to solve real problems (e.g. by teaming up
with the older generation) will be far more successful than those who don't.

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paulus_magnus2
Problem is there because someone is not willing to pay for solving it*

* sometimes (very rarely) there is money but no solutions exist

~~~
mgrennan
Maybe not so rarely. The tech bubble of some years back was money in search of
a solution.

