31

CREATIVE THINKING AND PROBLEM SOLVING (CPS)

Introduction
1.
A problem is a problem because there is no solution for it; more correctly, it is so
because a solution is not visible. Therefore, we must find a different solution. And
different means novel, i.e. creative. Creativity is the unbound talent for thinking differently. It
is the most potent force in our mind, which we traditionally have used very little of, because the
need was not felt. The need is now actually felt in an increasingly knowledge based world
where creativity is at a premium. Creative individuals think with greater fluency, more
flexibility and originality.
2.
Every human being, irrespective of age, intelligence, colour and faith is potentially
equally creative. But he uses an insignificant part of his creative mind. Imagine what
efficiency and morale the Army will have if we can use this power of every soldier and officer,
not to mention civilians in defence forces. It is possible.
Meaning
3.
In laymans language creativity is thinking differently or it is the imaginatively gifted
recommendation of known elements into something new. Therefore, it can be defined as
energizing connected mental communication to bring out something original, new and
different. It can now be summarized as Creativity is keeping blocked minds open.
4.
A workable definition of creativity could be as Creativity is the ability or the capacity
of to discover and explore new areas to create or produce a new idea, or theory or object
including the re-arrangement or reshaping of what already exists.
Necessity for Fostering Creativity
5.
Creativity is a very precious and unique quality in individuals that enables them to solve
complicated problems in different walks of life. Newton propounded his theory of gravitation
and laws of motion at a very young age. The genius of Galileo and Einstein was recognized at
their young age. Therefore, the gift of creativity needs to be nurtured right from childhood and
should be continued throughout adulthood.
Types of thinking and its Correlation with left and right Brain
6.
Two types of thinking are present in any individual; the convergent and the divergent.
Convergent thinking is the analytical aspect of thinking, while divergent thinking involves
selecting different approaches to a problem by deliberately shifting from one approach to the
other.
7.
The left side of brain specialises in convergent thinking, and the right side of brain is
adept at divergent and holistic thinking. For creative minds strength must be in both types of
thinking and above all there should be free communication between the left and right side of the
brain.

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Left Side

Right Side

Punctuality
Logical, Programmed
Alert, Rigid
Day light brain
Energy consumer (Tires you
out)
Calculating
Sensitive to cause and effect
relationship.
Follows rules, Traditions
(Conservative)
Fixed solutions
(based on logic only)
Irritable, Fighter,
Argumentative. (Win lose
solutions).

No limits
Fearless, adventurous
Risk taker
Relaxed & stress buster
Night time brain full of
fantasy (dreams)
Fun loving
Not logical (un-sequenced)
Unconcerned, wild
Creates new rules
Remembers faces & picture
images
Loves colours,
Tolerant, Friendly
Stupid, Cooperative.
Win win solutions

Managements Right Brain thinking to appt the ladies and girls as Drivers on Heavy
Veh/Dossers.
8.

A team of 13 women who were tea girls and sweepers breached a male bastion at TISCO,
Jamshedpur, driving and operating heavy vehicles, power trucks, dumpers, shovels, forklifts, caterpillars and even locomotives and ambulances. Till recently, these jobs were out
of bounds for women in all steel plants. (Ref Outlook 25 Aug 2003).

9.

These are typical reactions of left and right brain to a situation: (a)

What comes first 2pm? Or 3pm.?

(i)

Left brain answer

2pm.

(ii)

Right brain answer

Yes; also yesterdays 3pm before todays 2pm.

(b)

Your Window Breaks

A wheel squeaks

Left brain

Replace it
(Habit or traditional)

Oil it/replace bearing.

Right brain

Good, you can

now see clearly through it
(Positive attitude)

Eliminate need for bearing.

or

Ignore it (easy way out)

Eliminate wheel (Substitute

the function)

33
or
Close the wall, make a
better Window or fit a door
(even if it is not needed).

Introduce permanently
lubricated bearings.

or
Fit a transparent cement block
(Creative not yet invented)
Types of Creativity
10.

Creativity can be classified in to three classes: (a)

Chance Creativity.
The type of creative art or act that happens by pure luck
and can rarely be duplicated.
(b)
Spontaneous Creativity.
It means the ability to bring something new with
a feeling of spontaneity, which is, designed to meet an immediate purpose.
(c)
Conceivable Creativity.
Conceivable creativity refers to the process where
the things created does not necessarily meet an immediate purpose. There is very little,
if any, feed back available in this type of creativity. It comes through generation to
generation.

Nature and Characteristics of Creativity

11.
Creativity is an important process for the progress and major advances in every field.
All the advances are made as a result of new ideas or creative process. It is the basis of all the
social development and new inventions and discoveries in the field of science and technology.
Thus creativity, an extremely important concept, needs greater attention. Without creative
people we cannot invent, discover and advance in any field of knowledge. Therefore, it
becomes the responsibility of schools to develop and foster creativity among school children.
12.

The nature and characteristics of creativity are: (a)

Originality.

(b)

Usefulness.

(c)

Social acceptability.

(d)

New combinations of old components.

(e)

Talent Creation.

(f)

New and Novel Approach.

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Characteristics of a Creative Personality
13.
Torrance (1962) has compiled a list of eighty four characteristics of a creative
personality. Some of these are :(a)
Positive (and energetic) attitude towards work. (All types of jobs are good;
nothing is insulting).
(b)
Adventurous.
(c)
Curious by nature Remains in search of challenges, sees things in unusual
ways.
(d)

Desire to excel.

(e)

Conscientious and tenacious.

(f)

Flexible in his thinking, feeling and doing.

(g)

Self motivated.

(h)

Intuitive.

(j)

Openness/extrovert.

(k)

Inventive and visionary.

(l)

Non-conformist. (One & one how much? two is not correct. Can it be eleven ?.)

(m)

Tolerance of ambiguity.

(n)

Self-discipline.

(o)

Originality.

(p)

Fantasying (Fantasy lover).

(q)

Self confidence.

(r)
Liveliness/cheerfulness (Child smiles 400 times a day, a youth 15 - 20 times, but
a mature person hardly smiles).
(s)

Decisiveness.

(t)

Perceptive.

(u)

Wonderer, stupid.

14.
Creative children are constantly probing, discovering, imaging, fantasying, asking
questions and guessing.

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15.
The mind processes around 500 words per minute. The speakers at best at around 150
words in that duration. The idle capacity of the mind (of about 350 words) is utilised in forming
our judgment, reinforcing it and deciding what to speak next.
Steps to Deliberate Problem Solving
16.
There are five steps which have been identified from the creative problem solving
approach and are as under: (a)
Orienting the Problem.
Meant redefining the problem so that it is not too
narrowly defined, nor it is so broad that the ideas to follow subsequently become
irrelevant to the problem.
(b)
Get the Facts.The step of gathering facts highlighted the need to collect enough
facts so that an approach automatically emerges from the facts collected. However, time
and resource constraints may preclude such ideal conditions and one may be forced to
develop alternatives based on facts in hand.
(c)
Generation of Ideas. It involved free thinking and application of the principles
to creativity to develop original approaches or alternatives for problem solution.
(d)
Incubation. Implies sleeping over the problem. It is emphasized the need to
change the race of thinking by giving suitable brakes. A deliberate brake gives ideas
time to grow and if no ideas are emerges by them, the time may permit exploitation of
the sub conscious mind to give the desired sparks.
(e)
Evaluation of Ideas. It requires the sorting out of ideas based on certain criteria
such as :(i)

Cost.

(ii)

Practicability.

(iii)

Time dimension.

(iv)

Suitability

Is it permanent/stop gap solution?

(v)

Feasibility

Can we afford this approach/is it practical?

(vi)

Acceptability -

Barriers to Creativity.

By superiors and persons affected.

17.
There are many common barriers, which prevent full realization of a truly creative
approach to design. These can be classified under the following four heads :(a)
Personal & Perceptual Blocks.
Through the process of socialization people
develop certain attitudes in life, which in turn kill their creative abilities.
(b)
Emotional Barriers. Creativity diminishes to insignificance under high
emotional stress. An inferiority complex, resistance to change from the status quo and
also lack of rewarded stimulus can be barriers to creativity.
36
(c)
Social and Cultural Barriers. Emotions, habits and thoughts are strongly affected
by the cultural influences. Group activities may be a hindrance to creativity. Most
people are reluctant to accept change and hence they are either indifferent or negative to
proposed creative ideas.
(d)

Organisational Barriers.

A few of the barriers in this regard are as follows :-

(i)

Lack of effective communication.

(ii)

Satisfaction with status quo.

Principles of Creativity
18.

The three principles of creativity which help in keeping blocked minds open are :(a)
Deferred Judgment.
The principle of deferred judgment implies deliberately
postponing the inherent weaknesses of jumping to conclusions. Deferred judgment
helps in allowing different viewpoints of the same mind to mingle and interact freely so
that newer approaches emerge.
(b)
Shifting Entry Points.
The principles of shifting entry points involved
deliberate shift to new approaches, to switch from one perception of the problem to
another.
(c)
Kaleidoscopic Mind (MIND MAPPING).
The third principle involved
building into the mind the habit acquiring knowledge and experience to allow for
increase number of patterns. (Right brain works like nuclear explosion). The human
mind must be a prism which refracts the inputs available to it creatively.

36
37
Conclusion
19.
Creativity is an important process for progress and major advances in every field.
Advances are made as a result of new ideas or creative process. It is the basis of all the social
development and new inventions and discoveries in the field of science and technology.
Creativity, an extremely important concept, needs greater attention. Without creative people we
cannot invent, discover and advance in any field of knowledge. We in the Armed Forces need to
revisit creativity as a concept and make a conscious effort at allowing it to flower. This can
indeed be extremely difficult in a conformist, regimented and drill/practice oriented
organization like ours. The fast changing knowledge based world is that of the creative
individual or creative organizations like Microsoft who encourage thinking with the feet in
order to proactively change keeping individual and organizational interests paramount.

Appx A
SCENARIO/PROBLEM
MONKEYS NUISANCE IN TRG AT AEC TRG COLLEGE & CENTRE
HOW TO .. STATEMENTS?

How to _________________ ?
1.

Sterilize the Monkeys?

2.

Kill the Monkeys?

3.

Attract them to safe place?

4.

Shift AEC Trg College & Centre?

5.

Get Naga/Assam Regt?

6.

Constr temples in all Depts?

7.

Shaft the trg area?

8.

Prune the trees to stop their entry/exit routes?

9.

Electrify the fencing?

10.

Live with monkeys?

11.

Avoid monkey bites?

12.

To use Dummies/Robots?

13.

Use fire crackers/blank rounds?

14.

Tame langoors/dogs/leopards to keep monkeys away?

15.

To trg monkeys not to disturb trg?

16.

Make them sleep during day?

17.

To create a park for them

Appx A (Contd)
LAW OF ASSOCIATION

Monkeys Nuisance

Terrorists Nuisance

Solutions
1.

Pruning of trees to avoid their moves.

2.

Stop their entry/exit routes.

Yes

3.

Thickening of wiring & its electrification.

Electrification

4.

Use Drummers.
warning

Yes Use whistle as

Radio Set

5.

Use dummies/Robots.

Yes

6.

Use crackers/Sub sonic sound.

(Early warning element)

7.

Training langoors/Dogs/leopards.

Yes

8.

Kill them by poisoning.

Yes

9.

Sterilize them.

10.

Use of sentries at limited places.

Yes

11.

Constr of temples at may places.

Yes

12.

Attract them to some other place.

Yes

13.

Provide organized food to them.

No safe place.

14.

Dont provide food at all.

15.

Shift the AEC Trg College & Centre.

REVERSE the situation

(Shift Pakistan or
WIPE OUT PAK)

16.

Deploy Naga/Assam Regts.

Deploy Commandos

17.

Org catching by experts.

By villagers/commandos

18.

Provide incentives to Charmers.

19.

Deforest the complete trg area.

Yes

20.

Create monkey Park.

heaven

Create

21.

Irritate monkeys.

22.

Consult UNO.

Yes

POK

as safe
for them.

23.

Have more religious functions.

24.

No cooking in the centre :- Eat in civil.

25.

Minimise indoor trg.

26.

Identify their gp ldr.

Yes

27.

Use water pressure on monkeys.

Gas/Blind them

28.

Request forest dept.

29.

Donate monkeys as mementos to tourists.

to

Donate all terrorists caught

USA

30.

Use fire.

Use Security lights all

along the Border

31.

Drug the monkeys so that they sleep during day

when the trg is on.

Make them drug edit.

32.

Plant trees of their choice.

33.

Brain wash the monkeys.

Pak.

34.

Shifting of AEC Centre with Assam/Naga.

35.

Out source the problem

Brain wash them against

-do-

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Appx B
BLOCKS TO CREATIVE THINKING
(The knowledge block)
EXERCISE : uses of a brick
1.

A brick can be used for many purposes (e.g. as a support), quite apart from
construction(e.g.
for making pavements, roads, buildings, dams). Write down quickly, as many uses for a brick
which you can think of in about 3 minutes. Exclude construction.
2.
This exercise has been given to thousands of persons in all walks of life (including
students), of all ages & managerial levels. 99% persons could not think of more than five uses;
a
few beyond, upto ten uses. The maximum was 17. Younger persons and children fall into the
higher figure category. Most old persons (who actually know more uses) could not bring out
even five.
3.

Here is a typical list (This is only a small part of a much bigger list) :(a)

Stop a car (Chock)

(b)

Barrier

(c)

Filling ditches

(d)

Raise level of water

(e)

Stepping stones (in a flooded street)

(f)

Support

(g)

To sit on

(h)

Pillow (in camps)

(j)

Ballast

(k)

Karate practice block

(l)

Block flow of water

(m)

Powder (as abrasive) for cleaning utensils

(n)

To fill the gap

(o)

Blocking Heat

(p)

Used in space craft

(q)

Used in Dummy para drop

(r)

Scaring

(s)

Hitting/Killing Militants/Monkeys

(t)

Ice Cream Brick

(u)

Used as a Missile

(v)

Garden decoration

(w)

Safe for jewellary

(x)

Counterweight

(y)

Paperweight

(z)

Cricket stumps/bat

(aa)

Landmark (identification)

(ab)

Idol

(ac)

Chulah

(ad)

Measure of weight

(ae)

Measure of length

(af)

Measure of density

(ag)

To cover space

(ah)

Scouts Marker

(aj)

Map Reading Trg.

(ak)

Oil Absorber