330 JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS ence and observation, and is not scientific. This is most unfortunate. It is true that the empirical approach is based on experiment or experience, but in gathering his evidence, the experimentalist must be guided by scien- tific principles as rigid as those recognized by the model-makers. In a sense, every individual experiment which the experimentalist carries out is, or should be, an exercise in theoretical scientific problem-solving on the micro scale. By the nature of his work, however, the experimentalist is often unable to see far ahead. He must feel his way carefully from experiment to experiment, gingerly probing for profitable areas to explore. This kind of work is costly and time consuming it is, therefore, vitally important that the experimentalist should not only know how to do his work, but, still more important, he should know what to do. A worker who has the reputation for solving problems of this type quickly does not arrive at the solution by some magical process or just plain luck. His success is attributable to his intuitive ability to decide which is the most profitable experiment to do first. The experimentalist should be aware of the danger involved in the misuse of this technique. Just as the model-builder may lose his power of contri- bution by transferring his affection from the problem to the method, so the experimentalist can become a liability if he neglects scientific principles. Many a research director has become prematurely aged on being presented with a long series of experimental results without a "control," and the failure to recognize an important variable such as humidity, is another favorite pitfall. The experimental technique is, of course, uniquely suited to many in- dustrial problems. Workers in this field often deal with natural materials, with complicated resins, with blends and mixtures in which the components interreact in surprising and unpredictable ways. Although we have, for instance, a tremendous background of literature on the behavior of such materials as rubber, proteins and cellulose, I believe that workers in these fields would agree that we are not yet ready to tackle many of the problems of modern industry by the extensive use of theory. What of the experimentalists themselves? Perhaps, on an average they have not received the high degree of specialized training associated with the model-builders, but their experience is broad. They are generally practical minded, and their first impulse on tackling a problem is to get out into the laboratory and get started with some experiments. As a group, they com- municate less readily than the model-builders, both with their fellows and with people outside of their sphere. They are inclined to talk in terms of the feel, the smell, the look of a material rather than to show how nicely it fits into a theoretical framework. The experimentalist talks more about his results, and less about his technique. While every experimentklist fondly hopes that theoretical conclusions will ultimately be drawn froth his

PROBLEM SOLVING: METHODS AND PEOPLE 331 experimental evidence, he will not feel too guilty if he has merely solved the problem, without providing material for a theoretical treatment. Never- theless, many experimentalists feel frustrated because they are rarely able to follow through on the theoretical side once a problem has been solved from the practical standpoint. In discussing the results of his work with non-technical people, the experi- mentalist is sometimes at a disadvantage. His language, his approach and his end result may appear to be deceptively clear, so that the layman feels that he really understands what has been going on. The oversimplification of the process in his own mind leads him to question the expenditure of time and--let's face it--money on the problem. The model-builder is less likely to find himself challenged in this way. The layman stands in awe of him. His work is much less readily under- stood (or perhaps we should say misunderstood) by the layman and he is less vulnerable to criticism. On the other hand, the layman is more skepti- cal of the theoretical approach to "real" problems, and is often reluctant to utilize this technique when the problem justifies it. The third method of solving problems now available to industry is called Operational Creativity. It is obvious, of course, that the creative process is a necessary part of the techniques which we have previously discussed. Without it, the most rigorous scientific approach or the most carefully con- structed experimental system cannot advance into the unknown. How- ever, the exponents of Operational Creativity have deliberately set out to control and exploit the creative process, rather than let it happen in a hap- hazard fashion. They do this repeatedly, and at will. The technique now being used has evolved over the past ten years or so, primarily by the efforts of a group led by Dr. W. J. J. Gordon of Arthur D. Little, Inc. During the conception stage of an idea, their tools are talk and a tape recorder. They work in groups of four to five people, in sessions lasting two to three hours, trying by means of free association to determine, first of all, the fundamen- tal basis of the problem, and then ways to solve it. Ideas presented by the individual in the group need not always be practical, for they may stimu- late other ideas leading to a practical solution. Necessarily, therefore, their problems must be couched in broad terms, and in the conception stage they avoid becoming side-tracked by detail. Since innovation is their prime purpose, their choice of problem needs careful consideration. They measure their efficiency at innovation by their success in obtaining basic patents, as opposed to design patents. As might be expected, groups embarking on such a new approach to prob- lem solving will initially be somewhat inhibited in their reaction to free discussion. It is sometimes necessary in the early stage for the leader to withhold the specific problem until a session has got well under way by dis- cussing some basic concept such as "opening things." When the time is