Stop Guessing, Nat Greene
Stop Guessing, Nat Greene
List: $12.99 | Sale: $9.10
Club: $6.49

Stop Guessing
The 9 Behaviors of Great Problem Solvers

Author: Nat Greene

Narrator: Tom Dheere

Unabridged: 3 hr 25 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Ascent Audio

Published: 04/03/2017


Synopsis

Solving complex problems is very difficult and usually can't be done by simply brainstorming. Readers will learn how to successfully apply nine behaviors in a systematic and methodical way to solve any problem.

Most problems are fairly easy: they have a few likely potential root causes. The most important problems often have hundreds or thousands of potential root causes within very complex systems. Such problems are hard problems and are highly resistant to guessing, brainstorming, or problem-solving methodologies that require conjuring a list of possible causes. Great problem solvers are armed with a set of behaviors that allows them to avoid guessing. They consistently solve hard problems in a way that can seem magical to most people.

In Stop Guessing, you will learn nine behaviors that are critical to success and how to adopt them from Nat Greene, who has twenty years of experience leading great problem solvers. Developing strength in these behaviors will help you
¥ Have confidence to solve the hard problems you face
¥ Easily build alignment to implement the right solution
¥ Identify more important and valuable opportunities that are being ignored
¥ Help others become better problem solvers
¥ Stop wasting time and money and trying your patience

Each of the nine behaviors comes with stories of great problem solving in action, including a best-in-class chemical processor that had hundreds of millions of dollars of upside hidden behind a hard problem, a losing baseball team without the budget for star players, and the scourge of poverty in sub-Saharan Africa.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Chris on August 03, 2021

I listened to the audio book and I was hopeful at the beginning and quickly disappointed. I was expecting more concrete examples and better examples and stories of how to solve problems. The most memorable thing that I took away from the book is that relying on “experts” can sometimes be counter pro......more

Goodreads review by Jeff on April 04, 2017

The most valuable piece of this book to me was the way this approach to problem solving distinguishes between guessing/opinions and facts. I hadn't really thought about all of the examples in the book and how they related to guessing in my everyday life. It would have been great to have a bit more ti......more

Goodreads review by Robert on October 11, 2021

The book started out strong and I really liked the idea of focusing on behaviour rather than methods. The first couple of chapters were both enlightening and concrete. However, as I made progress in the book I felt that to truly explain and teach the behaviours, which Nat tries to do, you need examp......more

Goodreads review by Elizabeth on May 11, 2017

I consider myself a mediocre problem-solver, and am always looking for ways to improve, so Greene's book caught my attention. It was a fast read, but chock-full of practical advice and helpful illustrations (his and other's) which demonstrate effective problem-solving skills in action. Greene starts......more

Goodreads review by Claire on May 12, 2017

I've been working in the field of quality and continuous improvement for a decade and this is hands down the best book on problem solving I have ever read! It's made me look back on projects I've run or been involved in and think "well now it's obvious why we didn't succeed", hindsight is feeling a......more