Using Metaphors For Problem Solving

The following page on using metaphors for problem solving is an excerpt from the book "Problem Solving Power." You can download it right now for a very reasonable price. Use the link here to order or get more information... Problem Solving Book.

Metaphors are powerful tools for understanding things. "Tools," of course, is a metaphor. I could have said "way of understanding things," or "method." Each word or expression conveys a slightly different meaning, and gets you thinking in different ways. Use this power of metaphors to solve problems more creatively.

If you're an "employee," you'll think about your job in a certain way. An "associate," might feel more important and think differently about his duties. If you're a "business," selling your labor, then your "boss" becomes just a "customer." You can raise your prices, change your service, or look for other customers to contract with.

The Problem Solving Power Of Metaphors

Use a particular metaphor to solve a problem, and you'll get some ideas. Use another, and you'll get different ideas. Why not use as many as you can think of, to get the widest, most creative selection of ideas?

An example:

Mike wants to design, build and sell a new type of swimming pool. He starts with his pen and paper, and writes down as many metaphors as he can:

A swimming pool is a toy.
A pool is a status symbol.
A pool is a playground.
It is a park. It's a job.
It's entertainment.
It's an aquatic gym.
It's a decoration.
It's a deathtrap.
It's a personal lake.
It's an oasis.

Then he lists some metaphors for the activity of swimming:

Swimming is exercising.
It's vacationing.
It's playing.
It's therapy.
Then he lists some metaphors for selling.
Selling is a business.
It is teaching.
It's showing.
It's a contest.
It's talking.
It's advertising.
It's sharing.

Finally, Mike works with each metaphor, to see what ideas they produce:

As a "toy," pools for kids come to mind. As a "status symbol," Mike considers brass railings, liquor bars and other ways to make a pool seem "rich." "Deathtrap" reminds him to make it safe, and he imagines an alarm system triggered if a child enters the pool without supervision. "Oasis" gives him ideas for creating a tropical environment as part of the pool.

Swimming as "exercising" has him thinking of pools with a current. "Vacationing" Makes him wonder if more visual separation from the house would make the swimming "vacation" more relaxing. "Therapy" gives him some marketing ideas for older customers.

Selling the pools is a business, of course, but "teaching" has Mike thinking of ways to educate customers about the benefits of swimming. "Talking" makes him ask "Who will do the talking?" and leads to the idea of distributing videos to sell his pools. "Showing" generates several ideas for ways to display his pools, like free "pool parties" during summer.

As you can see, the application of new metaphors isn't limited to the original concept. It can be used on any part of the problem as well. Break a problem into a few components (the pool, swimming and selling, in the above example), find as many metaphors as you can for each, and note the ideas you get when using each.

You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created. - Albert Einstein