Solve a Problem Paper

Creative Thinking

Charles E Stove

PHL/458

October 3, 2011

Vish Patttanashetty

Describe each stage of the creative process using Ch. 5 of your text.

In Chapter 5 of the text it was stated that being creative is more than having certain traits. It means behaving creatively, addressing the challenges we encounter with imagination and originality. There are four stages to the creative process which are as follow: (1) Searching for Challenges (2) Expressing the Problem or Issue (3) Investigating the Problem or Issue and (4) Producing Ideas.

First Stage: Searching for challenges. This stage represents the habit of searching for challenges. Some challenges may be obvious while other challenges you may have to look for them. The essence of creativity is meeting challenges in an imaginative, original, and effective way.

Second stage: Expressing the Problem or Issue. The objective in this stage is to find the best expression of the problem or issue. Often, after expressing the problem or issue in a number of ways you will be unable to decide which expression is best and when this happens just postpone deciding until your work in later stages of the process helps you to decide.

Third Stage: Investigating the Problem or Issue. This will mean merely searching past experiences and observation to help bring it upfront to deal with the current problems and also to include interviews with experts or professional personal related to the issue or problems encountered. Conducting your own investigation is also quite helpful in this stage.

Fourth Stage: Producing Ideas. You will have to decide in this stage what to believe through your different ideas and what to do about it. Common obstacles in this stage are the tendency to limit your ideas to common, familiar, habitual responses and to block out uncommon, unfamiliar ones. The longer you continue producing ideas, the greater are your chances of producing worthwhile ideas. When you have produced a generous number of ideas, decide which seems to be to be the best. Sometimes a single idea will be best but other times two or more ideas will be better.

Search for a personal challenge. Explain how you used the techniques to develop curiosity in your search (see Chapter 6)

My personal challenge is to determine whether or not bottom cooling used in my workplace of manufacturing glass containers can help evenly distribute glass wall thickness throughout the {glass containers} bottles we produce.

In reading Chapter 6 of the text I found in the section of recognize the opportunity in controversy which is the 6th helpful techniques for regaining your curiosity to encourage this personal challenge. Several months prior the production line in which I am responsible for was producing bottles that were being rejected for thin glass wall distribution on the shoulders and mid body. I had a goal of 90% pack established for my production line. My goals were not being met and I felt that I had to shake things up to get to my established goal. I was not meeting the goals established for several days and all the experts had exhausted all possibilities and was content with the idea that the machine was not capable of making the bottle at the goal established. I am no expert in the bottle makeup but during my observation I realized that no one had every raised the bottom cooling on the fore hearth and the weekend while the experts were away I decided to give it a try and increased the cooling on the bottom to help control the flow of the glass. When the team arrived on Monday morning they were amazed at what had happen and I had to give them the information on what I did to get the shoulders and mid body to specification and raise the efficiency of the machine to 92% which is above the goal set for the machine.

Express the problem created by this personal challenge. Refine your expression of the problem by considering multiple perspectives and deciding which expression is best. Include both the initial and refined version. Justify your revision.Ch 7

How can I convince the experts of trying an idea they refused to believe in?

How can I win the expert acceptance to the fact that bottom cooling may help the glass distribution?

How