Using Problem-Solving Techniques to Solve Youth Risk Behaviours in the Community - Essay Example

Using Problem Solving Techniques to Solve Youth Risk Behaviours in the Community -Problem Solving Techniques In everyday organisational activities, problem solving and decision-making go hand-in-hand. Managers are bombarded with problems to challenge their thinking and juggling ability. A problem, according to Jonessen (2004) derives from the Greek word “problema” meaning obstacle or when an issue is uncertain; it must be examined and solved. How a problem is solved also depends on the method adopted for its resolutions. The more structured and systematic an approach for problem solving, the better the decision made because it removes ambiguity, reduces experience and judgement bias, facilitates easy assessment of situations, and allows the management to remain on the right track of organisational goals (Wilson 2000). There is a need to solve problems so that decisions can be made effectively. - Problem Identification Young individuals between the age group of 16 and 24 years are valuable resources for a nations future. They are often overlooked instead of offered community support system to foster creativity, productivity and development. There is a misconception that youths are essentially bad whereas research indicates that (Godwin 1998) adolescents and youths of today come under much pressure from society such as stress, fast-paced lifestyles, responsibilities at home, emotional upheaval, victimisation, and peer pressures. This is why young people today more than before tend to engage in drinking alcohol, violent crimes, promiscuity, and offences against the law. The widespread risk behaviours have developed a generation of young delinquents who require extensive help from the community. Some of the risk factors include lack of education, poor parenting and drugs problems according to Adamsons report on youth crime (2003). - Problem Analysis Problem solving techniques can be used to analyse youth risk behaviours. The process for resolving this issue and its causes can be plotted on the Gantt chart to see the milestones to be achieved: Gantt Chart: Problem Solving Techniques Lifestyle Education Parenting Poverty Fishbone SWOT Visualisation Brainstorming - Fishbone Diagram The problem of youth risk behaviours can be analysed by using the Fishbone diagram (Wealleans 2001). In the following diagram one can observe that youth risk behaviours are caused by individual attitudes (man), poverty (material), lack of education (machine), poor parenting (management), and peer pressure and lifestyles (environment). These causes also have sub-causes such as the need to be recognised or to find excitement; lack of education may be due to dropping out of schools; poor parenting may be due to absent working parents or belonging to single parents; and peer pressure may include victimisation or gang bullying. As a result of these causes and sub-causes, youths engage in the above risk behaviours (effect). Fishbone Diagram The Fishbone technique, a part of the cause-and-effect group, involves the identification of contributing factors (causes) of a problem (effect), and plotting them on a diagram resembling a fishbone. The effect is the end result while the bones are the causes of the problem which fall under the categories labelled manpower, equipment, operations, management, material and environment, and their subsets. Once the causes are identified, the management can concentrate on resolving the main cause of the problem and work down to the minor ones (Wealleans 2001). One of the causes for youth risk behaviour is lifestyle which has many factors contributing to it. Some of the sub-causes which can be mapped onto the fishbone diagram include: fast-paced lifestyle, unhealthy living, little opportunities to mingle with proactive people, focus on technology for fulfilling socialisation etc. Despite its efficacy, the fishbone technique is limited because it does not actually contribute significantly in solving the problem. It merely helps organise problem causes in a logical manner. Furthermore, not every problem has a cause-and-effect structure. For example a process team cannot use the fishbone regularly to generate causes all the time; it needs to generate solutions as well. Thus, it is not an appropriate tool to be used for everyday problems (Wealleans 2001). - SWOT Analysis Lack of education is a major problem among youths. Youths become disengage from learning activities. They are not motivated to learn due to a host of reasons including boredom, lack of funding from parents and perhaps the lack of enough institutions to cater to their individual needs. Instead, they spend their time being bored or engaged in risky activities like taking drugs, destroying public property, street brawl or drinking alcohol. SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis is a management tool for identifying problems that organisations encounter. By identifying strengths and weaknesses within against external opportunities and threats, a problem solver is able to reflect on the positive and negative influences which impact the problem. SWOT analysis is limited to the general analysis whereas in real life, problem solvers require detailed information for making effective decisions. (Wilson 2000) In dealing with youth risk behaviour, one of the causes is lack of education. A SWOT analysis can be used to analyse why organisations have not been able to extend education to these youths: Strengths: Large network of educational institutions to cater to large and diverse population of students. Weaknesses: Lack of specialised resources for tailoring education programmes to capture attention of youths with risk behaviours. Opportunities: Community centres, healthcare institutions, education network and policing resources are at disposable for collaborative work. Threats: Growing population of youths with risk behaviours. The analysis identifies that although education infrastructure and delivery are available, there is no cohesive structure to attract youths to the programmes. - Visualisation Parenting styles vary from individual to individual. However, there are healthy parenting style and poor ones which greatly impact the bringing-up of youths. Some may engage in authoritarian style to control behaviours while others let the children do whatever they want thinking this will boost creativity. The problem of poor parenting in youth risk behaviours can be visualised by plotting the factors and style for parenting. For example youths with drinking problems have origins from parents who indulge in high alcohol consumption can be presented in the following diagrams. Visualisation Diagram Source: Demos 2011 Visualisation has a wider role in problem solving situations including providing support in developing ideas and facilitating communication for better understanding. The key elements in visualisation problem solving approach are to identify the key components of the problem and the relationship which exist therein (Piggott and Woodham 2009). The visual diagram allows the user to understand the interplay between the internal and external components of the organisation and the problem. Furthermore, visualisation involves the formulation of strategy by plotting components of the problem precisely on the problem "map". This is called visual query construction. Based on the constructed strategy the solver can identify patterns and find solutions accordingly. Once solutions are generated, they are re-mapped onto the problem map to match with the query pattern to see which solution fits best. This embedded process is dynamic and cannot be categorised as a fixed process (Ware 2004). Visualisation in problem solving requires visualising skills including: Internalising (by creating imagery of the main elements of the problem); Identifying (identifying data to visualise); Comparing (the ability to differentiate elements of the problem); Connecting (connecting processes and structures to elements of the problem to create a cohesive picture); and Sharing (description of the visualisation to others for interpretation and clarifications) (Piggott and Woodham 2009) The above visual map indicates that there is no one parenting style which will work on its own. Youth risk behaviours result from adoption of extreme parenting style such as implicit authoritarian, laissez-faire, or love etc. which do not allow parents to have control over the youths. - Brainstorming Poverty is a prevalent factor for youth risk behaviours but it is not the sole cause. It can be observed that poverty stems from various factors which may or may not be directly related to youth risk behaviours. These factors include: Low income Lack of jobs available Poor parents who cannot afford to send children to school Poor social infrastructure for welfare Lack of programmes for youths Lack of skills To resolve the problem of poverty, brainstorming can be used. It is a group problem solving method which involves group members to come up with creative ideas using analytical, lateral, and creative thinking. Brainstorming if implemented with structured approach can become an effective tool for creative problem solving within a short period of time (Robson 2002). Some fundamental rules must be established to encourage group members to effectively contribute creative ideas and solutions. These rules may include: - No criticism of even the most ridiculous ideas through verbal or non-verbal communications. - Allowance for freewheeling of ideas - Allow members to generate as many ideas as possible - Record ideas regardless of viability or practicality - Evaluate all ideas for application and narrow down to a few to choose from (Robson 2002) There are some limitations to brainstorming as a problem solving technique. Some of the barriers to brainstorming hinder progress including the assumptions that ideas should be generated through established process and way of working. Similarly, when every member of the group is asked to pitch for ideas, some may refrain from asking questions and generate conventional ideas without adding value to the contribution. The tendency to evaluate solutions instantly often limits the scope of evaluating solutions comprehensively. One must understand that there is no one right answer when brainstorming for solutions (Robson 2002). Through brainstorming, the researcher has discovered that poverty is a pervasive problem among lower class which generates other sub-causes and thereby youth risk behaviours. For instance, the lack of education leads to lack of skills and hence individuals are not motivated to engage in productive activities. Similarly, the lack of infrastructure for welfare also increases poverty and hence leads to youth disengagement in education or learning experiences. What can a community leader do to alleviate this problem? Some of the options brainstormed include the following: a. Engage youths in effective partnership with community council b. Interact and engage young individuals to build youth-focussed policing environment c. Develop safe and congenial environment for youths to grow by eliminating risk factors d. Making education free for the deserving e. Effective parenting programmes to be set up for parents to join and community to monitor f. Community based youth development programmes for free which integrates practical skill development, formal education, career development, and counselling g. Developing rapid response team for youths in distress These factors indicate that no one approach can resolve the problem of poverty and its impact on youth risk behaviours. Instead, the community need to come up with a cohesive solution plan for this problem. To Solve the Problems of Youth Risk Behaviours in the Community According to NPIA report (2010), young individuals are law abiding and willing to commit to productive activities. What the community needs to understand is that today’s youths need practical infrastructure to foster their development in a positive manner. From the above analysis through Fishbone diagram, visualisation, brainstorming and SWOT, the researcher has come to the realisation that engaging youths in proactive activities is a productive approach to make both youths and community responsible for their behaviours. This way the community will be able to interact with the youths as well as be able to police them. There is a need for the community to engage young individuals in activities designed to foster youth development. Two triggering factors for youth risk behaviours are boredom and lack of monitoring authority. Developing a safe and congenial development environment not only eradicate these problems but also enable youths to channel their curiosity and productive time towards thinking about the future. However, such programmes need support from home as well as institutions. References Adamson, S 2003, New Deal for Communities: The National Evaluation, Research Report 4: Youth Crime: Offender Based Approaches to Reduction. Online accessed on 11 November 2011 from: Demos 2011, “Poor parenting increases likelihood of binge drinking at ages 16 and 34” Online accessed on 11 November 2011 from: < http://www.demos.co.uk/press_releases/parentingbingedrinking> Godwin, T 1998, Peer Justice & Youth Empowerment: An Implementation Guide for Teen Court, DIANE Publishing. Jonassen, DH 2004, Learning to Solve Problems: A Handbook for Designing Problem-Solving. John Wiley and Sons. NPIA, 2003, Local Policing Guide for Early Intervention and Prevention of Youth Crime and Anti-social Behaviour. Online accessed on 11 November 2011 from: Piggott, J and Woodham, L 2009, Thinking Through, and By, Visualising HRICH. Online accessed on 11 November 2011 from: Robson, M 2002, Problem-Solving in Groups. Gower Publishing Ltd. Ware, C 2004, Information Visualization: Perception for Design, Morgan Kaufmann, 2004 Wealleans, D 2001, The Organizational Measurement Manual. Gower Publishing, Ltd. Wilson, G 2000, Problem Solving. 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