After researching how to think outside the box to solve problems I decided that it would be a good idea to make a meeting agenda to try and implement my research in an organised way.
From my research I found that in order to ‘think outside the box’, I must define and measure the problem, admit when I don’t know or understand what to do and then begin again if things don’t go right. By defining what the problem is, what the contents of the box are, per say, helps to ultimately deal with the problem. All the necessary material to solve a problem are within it. Thinking outside the box means that you cast off the atmosphere that envelops you, leaving your previous experiences and mindsets/attitudes behind and view things from a different perspective.
I read when researching thinking outside the box that slipping into a new role was helpful in changing your perspective. When a problem arose I therefore tried to put myself in a different role, not as the mentor of someone but as a friend, what advice would I give them for their problem now? The responsibility that came with being a peer mentor seemed to affect my decision making and problem solving skills as I felt unequipped for the role, not due to lack of training rather confidence. Perhaps I should have focused on gaining more confidence as a goal of personal development… But, I found that slipping into a new role changed the way I thought about things, quite drastically. For example, when my mentees were not attending meetings or replying to my messages, as myself, their peer mentor wanted to keep on trying to engage them by messaging and planning new, interesting meetings. Then when I changed my role/perspective and thought what an outsider would do, I realised that continuing to message them was not effective and instead I should leave it for a while until they decide to reply or interact. It seemed the more I messaged, the less they replied or read the messages. It was difficult for me to let go in a way as I felt like I was failing as a mentor because my group were not engaging with the scheme but by changing my perspective, it allowed me to take a step back and recognise that things are out of my hands. To try and solve the problem, I had to leave the problem alone as nothing I could do would solve it.
5 steps I decided to take to evaluate my specific problem that was inhibiting my role were:
- Try to eliminate the problem – I couldn’t physically do this
- Try to shrink the problem – This was a great problem for me as a lack of engagement from my mentees not only affected my role but my module/assessment
- See if you can delegate the problem to someone else – I could go to others for advice, but there was nothing they could do about it
- Ask yourself what insight would make the problem easier to solve – having more training or experience may have helped me to solve the problem as well as making some different decisions earlier on in the role
- Question whether you actually need to solve the problem right now – By the time I sat down to try and solve this problem, it was already December and some other mentors already stopped working with their mentees as they didn’t require their help anymore. I just had to accept that this may be the case and that I should stop trying to solve the problem and use the things I have learned in a wider sense.
After I realised there was not much in my power I could do to solve the problem in a short space of time, I decided that there were many things I could have done to prevent problems arising that I did not do. For example, if I had made it clearer at the beginning that my role was voluntary and I required their participation for my module, in addition to it being beneficial to them, maybe they would have been more likely to attend. Overall, my research in solving problems by thinking outside the box has been helpful in the long run as it has given me tips and strategies for approaching future problems but has mainly made me reflect on what I did wrong earlier in the process.