What channels will be most effective?
You can use your voice to convince others how government should work or what causes matter. There are many ways to do that. With limited time and resources, it makes sense to take a step back and explore what path is best to improve the government.
Complex problems are often vague and have many possible solutions. The Meta-Problem Method may lead you far away from the dilemma that started your quest. That’s because the method forces you to clarify what you really want and what you are willing to give up. It enables you to compare objectively the possible pathways and their trade offs. It prevents you locking into solutions mode too early and then doubling down on solving a low-yield problem that does not serve your goals as well as the alternatives. At the end of this process, you will have a better understanding of your priorities and how to achieve them.
Steps in the Meta-Problem Method
Dilemma
The high-level issue you are trying to address
Pick the most powerful communication channels.
Goal
The changes you want to make to address the dilemma. There are usually many options.
Supporting Goals
- More people agree with your point of view.
- Government improves because of your efforts.
Other goals could include specific changes you would like to see in the world, minimizing your time spent, improving your own life specifically, or moving the government to be fairer or kinder.
Problem Space
The set of problems you could chose to solve to advance your goals, plus the constraints that hold you back.
Example problems
- How can I get as many people as possible to agree with my point of view? Maybe the problem to solve is “Which platforms and formats will I be most effective on, given my skills and the caliber of the competition?”
- How can I maximize the odds that the government improves? Maybe the problem to solve is “On which causes could I personally improve the odds, and what steps would I need to take?”
There are many other potential problems to solve related to choosing what to say. Each goal has many possible problems we could link to it. Are there other problems linked to these first two goals? Which options come to mind for the other goals?
High-Yield Problems
Sometimes solving one problem helps make progress towards several goals. In this step, we identify these “two-for-the-price-of-one” problems.
Which options will advance more than one goal?
- Writing on social media can be a great way to reach a lot of people, is fast, and means you can write about whatever topic you most care about. However, it can be hard to tell if you’ve had any effect at all, and social media is not the best format to communicate complex or nuanced issues.
- Directly talking to your elected officials can help government improve because of your efforts, allows you to focus on what matters to you, can improve your own life, and generally allows for a more complex and nuanced take. However, it can be more time-consuming, stressful for some, requires you to be good at communicating, and may change a smaller number of people.
There are many potential solutions that will have varying effects on the set of goals. Which alternatives improve the most important goals? How might the unknown change the right path forward? What other possible solutions are there to address the dilemma?
Problem Selection
Which of the many possible options in the high-yield problem step is the best set to address the dilemma?
- Which solutions make the most sense when you’re trying to improve the government?
- Which solutions will best address the dilemma?
- Which solutions will deliver the best outcome for the least amount of time, effort and money?
Implement, Learn and Adapt
Check continuously that you are still solving the best problem, as new information emerges.
Observe and learn as you go. As new information reveals itself, check continuously that you’re still solving the right problem.