Don’t Solve Every Problem Alone

Many years ago I worked with a consulting group that really upped my game as a leader. After working with our coach for a bit, I attended an in-depth, weeklong session that helped me see what I needed to work on to improve my level of management. I walked in feeling out of my depth, and I walked out feeling like I was armed with tools and processes to keep me focused on my own development. 

One great tool I walked away with was a way to run tight meetings in order to problem-solve with others. This process has been a tool I have relied on a lot over the years—both internally with my own teams and externally to host productive networking sessions at events. 

This process is called Nominal Group Technique (NGT), which sounds very clever, I know! It’s a way to use a group brainstorming session to identify ideas and rank them. It is pretty simple, and I’ll walk us through how to do it below. But I also want to share what I have learned from using this process over the years. I am not the inventor of NGT, but over time I have fine-tuned my use of it to match the particular situation, problem, or audience. 

Leaders, managers, and owners are often brought problems from others in their organization. I find new leaders tend to take those problems, own them, and then work alone too hard and for too long. I highly encourage new leaders or managers to read The One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey by Ken Blanchard, William Oncken, Jr., and Hal Burrows to understand this risk. There is a delicate balance between being a leader and problem solver and just inheriting a whole set of problems that shouldn’t be dumped in your lap. 

I think NGT can help leaders when that situation comes up. The beauty is that you don’t always need another group of leaders to use this method. It truly is an open brainstorming session, and it only takes about 10 minutes to get started. You need:

• A group of 4 to 10 people besides yourself 

• A timer

• Something to record on (paper, computer, tablet, or phone—whatever works best for you)

Here is an outline of the basics:

  1. Prepare your problem as a question and present it to the group (1 minute).

  2. Give everyone time to note down some ideas (2 minutes).

  3. Go around the table to gather rapid-fire suggestions (5 minutes).

  4. Clarify suggestions and discuss solutions (2 minutes).

  5. Close the meeting by outlining the next steps identified.

Make sure your problem is in the form of a question. Setting up the discussion this way allows for more-focused responses. This concept is especially relatable right now as everyone is using AI prompts more and more. We are learning very quickly that the right prompt makes all the difference! 

Here is an example of turning a problem into a question: Let’s say you’re tasked with hiring a new project manager. If this is something you have never done before, you might want to get feedback from a team in your company. When preparing the question to ask the group, you could phrase it as: “What steps should I take to hire an experienced project manager who will fit in well with our company culture?” You don’t need recruiters in the room. All those on the team somehow got a job with your company and they may have great feedback as to how that happened!

Here’s an outline of the process:

• When you gather a team for NGT, let people know you are stuck on something and are looking for group feedback to move forward productively. I’d suggest giving them the NGT steps and the topic you are going to be discussing a few days ahead of time so people can think about it. 

• When you get everyone together, first review the steps. Be sure to let them know they’re in a judgement-free zone and every suggestion is welcome and appreciated!

• Read the question aloud and give everyone a moment to think. Allow them to ask you any clarifying questions. You may also want to prepare a few different versions of your question ahead of time so they can help provide clarity if needed. 

• Go around the room asking everyone to provide a solution to the question. This is a rapid-fire approach, so there should be no long sidebars or explanations. You just want quick thoughts. 

• Record every idea without judgement, taking down the suggestions even if the idea is repeated. If someone isn’t ready, they can pass during that round. You keep repeatedly going around from person to person until everyone runs out of ideas or your timer goes off.

• Read the list of suggestions to everyone in the room. If there are any you want to discuss further to gain clarity, now is the time to do this.

• Through the discussion, start to focus on a few suggested solutions that you feel are a good match. Narrow it down to about three options and rank those in order of where you’d like to start. Continue to read the room to see if there is agreement on that approach or if you missed something key that the group is seeing.

• At the end of the meeting, thank the group and give them a quick summary of the plan to move forward. 

I suggest you also take advantage of further follow-up. Writing an additional “thank you” in email or a chat platform opens up a channel for future feedback. It can also give you an opportunity to continue the conversation. If someone has a strong interest in the issue, you might be able to have them join you! And of course, as you make progress on the project, drop a line to the group to keep them up to date. People love to know where something they contributed to ends up! Plus, they may be motivated to join you again or encourage others to do the same. 

Another advantage to this technique is that you can pull in anyone and everyone. Bringing in folks from multiple departments and different levels of experience will give you a diversity of thought in problem-solving that you don’t get inside your own head. 

If using NGT with large groups at an event, I suggest putting the steps up on a large screen so everyone in the room can see the process. Provide participants with suggestions of common business problems phrased as questions for them to work through in the session. For each question, one person needs to act as the leader in the conversation, to ask the question and record the solutions. Provide pen and paper or a simple template to help keep them from getting stuck in the process. Another person needs to be the timer. 

Add a few extra minutes to each step in the process outlined above, as the group may not know each other and therefore may be hesitant to dive right in. Plan that each question may take about 15 minutes to get through instead of 10 minutes and then prepare enough sample questions for the allotted time. It is also beneficial to have a moderator in the room helping remind people when it’s time to change to a new question to keep the conversations moving forward. 

As a leader in the business world, you need to be able to solve problems, but that doesn’t mean you need to have all the answers yourself. Use the people around you to help! As you use NGT more and more, you will get better and better at it. Find ways to make it work for your team while keeping the flow of thought moving and respecting everyone’s contributions. You work hard to bring good people to your team, so let them help you continue to make your business strong!

Published in C&R Magazine