Activity | Problem Solving

Final Assignment
1) Introduction
The final assignment is worth 40% of your final grade and is mandatory if you want to successfully complete
the course.

You must complete this exercise per the instructions below and then submit it, along with a brief report, to
your buddy. Your buddy will receive an email notification and will be asked to review your assignment and
your report and confirm that it has been completed according to the instructions.

Make sure you discuss any issues with your buddy and / or ask me or your peers in the study group to see if we
can help!

2) Assignment Instructions
For this final assignment, you will get a chance to pull together all the concepts you have learned in the course
and practise solving a specific problem at your organisation. If you wen through the activities diligently, then
this should be a simple exercise of writing down what you came up with during those practice exercises.

Download the ‘Problem solving steps’ tool from the resources section and start filling it out. In the first
section of the tool, write down any challenges that your team or company could be facing, your
thoughts on how your customers’ experiences could be improved, what you could learn from your
competitors, and any anticipated changes that the organisation might face which could pose a
challenge or opportunity. Select one challenge that you’d like to focus on/solve and write it down in the
text field provided.
To solve that problem, we have learned that you first need to understand it by breaking it down into the
different factors that contribute to it (using an Issue Tree) and then when you narrow in on a part of the
tree you want to solve, asking yourself ‘Why’ five times as per the 5 Whys tool in order to get to the root
cause of the problem (the real, underlying problem that you actually need to solve).
Now that you know what the root cause is, you are ready to solve the problem. Do you have a
straightforward solution to it? If so, write it down in section 3 of the tool. If not, please use the Different
Perspectives questions to help you think differently about the problem and come up with new ideas and
possible solutions to it.
If you have more than 1 solution you came up with, use the Decision Matrix section of the tool to help
you select the best idea that has the highest chance of meeting your criteria of success.
Now refer to the Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle in section 5 of the tool to come up with a simple project plan
on how you are going to implement your solution. Make sure to include your overall objective and the
steps you’ll need to take to try it out in a pilot.
Now complete the short report in the last section of the tool.

Well done! You have solved a problem in 6 simple steps. Share your plan (i.e. the filled ‘Problem solving steps’
tool) with your Buddy or Accountability Partner and let them give you feedback on what they think about your
problem and proposed solution.
3) Assignment Report and Submission
Once you have completed the assignment and the short report, you are ready to submit your assignment.

Go to the main course page and in the ‘Conclusion’ lesson, click on ‘submit assignment’ tab. Click ‘add
assignment’ and find your assignment in your folders. Once the file is selected, click the green ‘upload
button’. Add a message to your buddy (see the on the assignment tab for instructions).

When you’re ready….click SUBMIT ASSIGNMENT! The assignment will be sent to your buddy (and a COPY of
that message will be sent to you so that you know it went). You can follow up with your buddy to ensure they
received it and will review it for you. If, after a few days, your buddy has not yet reviewed your assignment, you
can go to the My Courses page and get a new buddy.

Once you are done with the assignment, please download it and submit it using the next tab called
Submit Assignment. Please note that you can also record your responses as you go through the
assignment and upload the audio file once done or write down your responses on a piece of paper, take
a photo of it and upload it as your submission.

Congratulations!
Congratulations on completing the core components of the course! Please make sure you look back through
all of the lesson quizzes to ensure you completed each one correctly and have finished all components.
Please practice using the tools that were provided to you in this course as well as applying the skills you’ve
learned to enhance your business compliance status. You can always refer to this course and our toolkits
whenever you have questions related to business compliance.

I hope to see you in our next course!