Okay, let's get into this. You know those times
you're trying to tackle a problem maybe at work
or something in your community and it just feels
slippery. Oh, definitely. Like the more you try
to get a handle on it, the harder it is to even
define. And everyone seems to see it completely
differently. Absolutely. Some challenges just
feel fundamentally different. They're not like
the puzzles we solve in, say, science or engineering.
They really defy that kind of neat, clear definition
and, you know, that sense of resolution we often
expect. Exactly. It's not like fixing a, I don't
know, a broken engine or solving a math equation.
And there's actually a framework for understanding
this. It came about back in 1973 from Horst Rotel
and Melvin Weber. Urban planners? Yeah. And in
their work, they drew this really sharp line
between what they call tame problems and something
much, much trickier, wicked problems. And that
distinction is so key. It's not just about being
complex or difficult. It's about the actual nature
of the problem. So our mission, really, in this
deep dive is to unpack that Riddle and Weber
framework. What makes a problem wicked? How is
that different from a tame one? And crucially,
why is recognizing that difference change everything
about how you'd even approach it? Okay, so let's
start with the side we probably recognize more
easily. Tame problems. What do they mean by tame?
Well, tame problems are the ones where, generally
speaking, you can agree on what the problem is.
You can define it. OK. You can understand it,
maybe attribute it to one or just a few clear
causes. And really importantly, there's usually
a shared understanding of when it's actually
solved. Ah, so you know when you've reached the
finish line. Exactly. You know when you're done.
So you can tackle them systematically. Use scientific
methods, engineering approaches, guided by clear
goals. You know, systems thinking helps find
the best path to that defined solution. But tame
doesn't mean simple, right? I mean, building
a suspension bridge must be a tame problem in
this sense, but it's incredibly complex. Precisely.
Yeah, tame isn't about easy or unimportant. These
can be huge, vital undertakings. Think about
developing a new vaccine or designing a city's
sanitation system, improving crop yields through,
you know, agricultural science. These are complex,
definitely. Lots of variables, ethical questions
sometimes. Sure. They fit that structure. Definable
problem, understandable process, mostly consensual
goals and solutions. And tackling these tame
problems, well, it's changed the world, hasn't
it? Oh, without a doubt. A massive amount of
human progress, better health, infrastructure,
feeding billions. It comes from applying these
systematic methods to solve these, well, tame
challenges. Okay, but here's the pivot. Riddle
and Weber looked at problems in their field.
Urban planning. social policy. And they realized
these problems just don't fit that mold. They
argued most social problems are fundamentally
not tame. And that's where they coined the term
wicked problems. Unlike the tame ones, wicked
problems, well, they often can't be easily understood
or even completely defined. There's often deep
disagreement about what the problem really is
or even if it's a problem at all for some people.
Just reaching consensus on its nature or how
you might resolve it, it's incredibly difficult.
So any understanding feels provisional. Very
much so. Tentative is a good word. Judgments
are difficult. And we're talking about things
like education reform, or dealing with chronic
homelessness, or maybe local governance conflicts.
Exactly the kinds of issues they were grappling
with. And their really crucial insight, the main
takeaway, was this. The methods and the mindsets
that work so well for tame problems. They simply
will not produce adequate solutions for wicked
ones. So trying to treat a wicked problem like
it's tame. It actually gets in the way. It's
an impediment to planning, they said. It's often
counterproductive. Wow. OK, so that's a fundamental
shift. It's not just a harder version of a tame
problem. It needs a completely different way
of thinking. Absolutely. Wicked problems demand
different planning approaches, different kinds
of actions, and really different ways of even
evaluating if you're making any headway. So like
efficiency? That's great for tame problems, right?
Getting the bridge built on time, on budget.
Right. But it doesn't make much sense for a wicked
problem, where the goal itself might be completely
contested or unclear. What are you being efficient
towards? Good point. Okay, so let's really dig
into why they're so different. What gives them
this wickedness? Well, a lot of it comes down
to their social nature. The fact that they involve
diverse groups of people all with their own valid
but often conflicting viewpoints and values.
Riddle and Weber laid out several specific characteristics.
Okay, let's walk through them. The first one
that always strikes me is that they're ill -defined
or no definitive formulation. Right. You can't
just write down a neat problem statement for
a wicked problem like you can for, say, a math
theorem. The boundaries are fuzzy. What does
that mean, fuzzy boundaries? It means it's hard
to tell where the problem stops and its context
begins. And what's really tricky is that the
way you understand the problem is totally tangled
up with the solution you might propose. How so?
Well, if you suggest one type of solution, you're
often implicitly defining the problem in a particular
way. suggests a different solution, and you're
kind of redefining the problem itself. You can't
cleanly separate understanding the problem from
formulating a solution. Cause and effect get
blurred. So you can't just, like, run diagnostics
and find the single root cause in isolation the
way you might with a machine. Not really, no.
The causes are often deeply embedded in the whole
social system, and they're intertwined with potential
solutions, which leads to the next point. There's
no stopping rule. Unlike our bridge, where you
know it's finished when traffic can cross it.
Exactly. With a wicked problem, there's no natural
or logical or agreed -upon point where you can
definitively say, OK, solved, we're done here.
So it just keeps going. You might reach a point
where things seem better or an approach is deemed
good enough for now given the current politics
or resources. But conditions always change. People's
priorities shift. So there's always room for
improvement or refinement or even completely
new approaches down the line. I think you used
the sandcastle analogy before we started recording.
You can always add another turret. Exactly. Or
dig the moat deeper. You just decide to stop
working on it at some point. Maybe because you
run out of time or energy or the tide's coming
in. But the problem itself hasn't vanished. It's
just changed state. Precisely. It's just in a
different state. And because there's no clear
stopping rule, it follows that there's also no
ultimate evaluation. Meaning you can't just stamp
a solution correct or incorrect. Right. True
or false. Right. Solutions to wicked problems
aren't judged as true false or accomplished,
not accomplished in some final objective way.
They tend to be judged as better or worse, maybe
good enough, acceptable or unacceptable. Judged
by them. By the people affected. And those judgments
are inherently subjective. They're based on people's
values, their unique perspectives, their circumstances,
which are always changing. What one group sees
as a definite improvement, another group might
see as making things worse. So relying purely
on, say, quantitative metrics won't cut it. Oh,
far from it. You could have a single program,
let's say a new school curriculum. It might get
positive reviews based on initial test scores,
right? Yeah. Let's go down paper. But maybe years
later, people realize those same students struggle
with critical thinking in college. So the evaluation
shifts. It becomes negative. Success is completely
dependent on whose perspective you adopt, what
criteria they value, and when you're actually
asking the question. That sounds messy. And it
leads into another really difficult characteristic.
Every solution matters. And this idea that there's
no right to be wrong in the way a scientist might
test a hypothesis. Yeah, this one carries a lot
of weight. Unlike, say, building engineering
prototypes that you can test and discard if they
fail. Or running simulations. Exactly. When you
implement an approach to a wicked social problem,
it has real, tangible, and often irreversible
consequences for the people involved. You can't
just try out a solution on a community and then
say, oops, didn't work. let's scrap it without
having caused real impact, maybe harm. Like changing
how reading is taught in elementary schools.
That fundamentally affects those kids' futures,
right? You can't just hit rewind. Exactly. You
don't get a do -over on the same group of people
without consequences. And this places a huge
ethical responsibility on anyone trying to intervene
in a wicked problem. You have to act with the
best possible information and judgment, knowing
the stakes are high. And given all this complexity,
just copying a solution that seemed to work somewhere
else, probably a bad idea. Very likely, yes.
Which brings us to the next point. Each wicked
problem is unique. And therefore, each wicked
solution is unique, too. Why unique? Because
the specific context, the history of the place,
the local culture, the particular mix of people
involved, the political dynamics, the economic
situation, all these factors interact in incredibly
complex ways. You simply can't replicate those
conditions perfectly from one city or one organization
or one community to another. So taking a successful
anti -poverty program from city A and just dropping
it into city B, no guarantee it works the same
way. Absolutely not. It might fail spectacularly
or have completely unforeseen side effects. This
uniqueness means there's no standard playbook,
no set of best practices you can just pull off
the shelf. So you need... what? Creativity. Yes.
Innovation, creativity, deep contextual understanding.
You have to design approaches tailored specifically
to that unique situation. Unlike a game like
chess, with fixed rules and a defined set of
possible moves, with wicked problems, there are
no predefined limits on potential solutions.
You essentially have to invent them. And it gets
even more tangled, doesn't it? Because these
problems don't exist in neat little boxes. They're
interconnected. Right. Deeply so. Wicked problems
are almost always part of a larger network of
problems. One issue might be a symptom of a deeper
problem or a cause of several others or maybe
both. Like pulling on a single thread in a sweater.
And the whole thing shifts, yeah. Trying to solve
just one piece in isolation is incredibly difficult,
maybe impossible. And worse, your well -intentioned
solution in one area might trigger completely
new unexpected problems somewhere else in the
system. You fix traffic congestion here and suddenly
parking becomes a nightmare over there. That
kind of thing, exactly. And you often don't have
control over all the factors that are influencing
the problem or the potential outcomes of your
actions. An external event, a political shift,
resistance from a powerful group. Any of these
can derail even the most carefully planned approach.
OK, that interconnection and lack of control
definitely ramp up the wickedness. Now. The last
characteristic you mentioned, and maybe this
is the most fundamental, is multiple valid perceptions.
Yeah, this really gets to the heart of the social
dimension. The very same situation, the same
problem, can be described and understood accurately,
but in completely different, even contradictory
ways, by the different people or groups involved.
You mean they're not just disagreeing, they actually
see it differently? Yes. And their views can
all be valid from their own standpoint. Riddle
and Weber gave this fantastic, vivid example
from a real -world debate about school funding.
Members of the same community described their
local schools as, listen to this, a glorified
babysitting service, an unbearable burden on
the taxpayer, the best investment in our future,
and a priceless source of community pride. Wow.
All those things at once. How about the same
school? Exactly. And from the perspective of
the person saying each phrase, their description
felt entirely true and justified based on their
own experiences, their values, their priorities.
So there's no single objective truth about the
school system in that case? Precisely. This highlights
that with wicked problems, people's subjective
experiences aren't just noise to be filtered
out. They are the reality you have to work with.
Understanding those diverse, valid perspectives
is absolutely key to even be to navigate the
problem. Okay, so putting it all together. This
framework paints a picture of wicked problems
as these really messy, complex social challenges.
They have no clear definition, no single right
solution, no definite endpoint. They're judged
subjectively, unique to their context, tangled
up with other problems, and viewed in fundamentally
different ways by the people involved. That's
a great summary. And crucially, trying to tackle
them with the tools and mindset suited for tame
problems, that systematic, find the optimal solution
approach, it just doesn't work. It misses the
point. point so this whole framework it's valuable
because what it helps make sense of why some
of those huge persistent challenges we see in
society in our organization maybe even in our
own lives why they feel so hard so controversial
so ongoing exactly it gives you a language a
lens to understand that feeling of intractability
and it really shifts your expectations doesn't
it you kind of stop thinking okay how do we solve
this once and for all and you start asking different
questions You really do. You move away from searching
for the optimal permanent fix. Instead, the focus
shifts towards things like managing the inherent
complexity, learning how to navigate all those
different valid perspectives, finding approaches
that are maybe good enough or better for now,
and critically building in the ability to constantly
adapt as the situation inevitably evolves. So
for you listening, really grasping this difference
between tame and wicked problems the way Riddle
and Weber laid it out. It can genuinely change
how you think about tackling the really tough
stuff, especially anything involving diverse
groups of people and complex social systems.
It really underscores the purely technical or
engineering mindset. While incredibly powerful
for certain kinds of problems, the tame ones
is just insufficient on its own when you're dealing
with issues rooted in diverse human values, tangled
histories and interconnected social realities.
You need something more. Which kind of leaves
us with a big question to ponder, doesn't it?
If these wicked problems truly have no definitive
solutions in the traditional sense, no clear
finish lines, and their outcomes are judged subjectively
from all these different valid viewpoints, then
when we engage with them, what should the real
goal actually be? Is it progress as we normally
define it? Is it about building resilience? Is
it just continuous adaptation? Or is it maybe
something else entirely, something that isn't
really about solving at all?