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Super models

By Mike Clayton (January 2008 Issue)
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One of the most widely recommended business books is Roger Fisher and William Ury’s Getting to Yes. Their four principles have transformed the way many people think about negotiation, since its first publication in 1981. In it, they introduce a powerful problem-solving and creative thinking model to support one of their four principles: “Invent options for mutual gain.”

The tool is, unassumingly, referred to as the circle chart. The circle is divided into quadrants, each linking to the next and representing a different mode of thinking.

Step one is about the Problem. We examine what is wrong in the real world, and how the unwanted situation differs from the ideal.

At step two, Analysis, we diagnose the problem, looking for reasons, causes and explanations. To support this mode of thinking, we sort, sequence and prioritise the symptoms. Effective work at this stage eschews single causes and seeks any factor that may have a bearing on the problem.

We now move towards solutions. In step three, Approaches, we identify all possible strategies to address the problem. This is a theoretical assessment and we avoid evaluating the ideas, in favour of generating the widest possible range of options.

It is at step four, Action Ideas, that we return to the real world and determine, from our potential approaches, what we might do, what steps we can take, and their implications.

One important feature of Fisher and Ury’s description is that the chart works in both directions. Not only can our ideas feed into the next stage, but we can also take an idea from one stage – step four, say – and backtrack to step three. Now we ask: ‘How can we generalise this into a wider principle?’ From the more general principle, we can generate more solutions at step four.

Readers with experience of neuro-linguistic programming will recognise this process as ‘chunking’. Indeed, the whole circle chart may well ring bells, even with those wholly unfamiliar with it. The basic principle shows up in many models. In learning theory, for example, the four steps of ‘what, why, how and what if’ remind us of Bernice McCarthy’s 4MAT model (TJ, May 2007).

Coaches will see a shadow of the GROW model (Goal, Reality, Options, Will) and structured problem-solvers will hear echoes of the Kepner-Tregoe rational process
(What’s going on? Why did it happen? Which course of action? What lies ahead?).

The universality of this model endorses its power and wide application. It can be the basis of any structured thought process, so it’s a bit of a Swiss army knife of a model for the trainer and coach; all the better for its simplicity and unpretentious language.

Its flexibility makes it a valuable part of your toolkit – both for adapting to your learners’ needs in a wide variety of situations and for helping you to plan, create and develop. After all, isn’t this how many of us naturally think?

References:
1. Getting to Yes, Roger Fisher and William Ury, Random House
2. http://www.pon.harvard.edu/hnp/theory/tools/circlechart.shtml

Dr Mike Clayton founded Thoughtscape to offer coaching, training and facilitation, with a focus on managing and leading in the context of change. He can be contacted at mike@thoughtscape.net.

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