Define your problem. Grab a sheet of paper, electronic notebook, computer or whatever you use to make notes, and define your problem in detail.

界定你的问题。随便一张纸，用你的手写手机，电脑也可以，只要能记下你的笔记就可以，详细而周密地定义你的问题，一旦你这么做了，你将发现很快会有解决方案。

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If you define the problem too broadly, your solutions may be out of scope and irrelevant to the business context.

而如果你把问题定义得太宽泛，你的方案又可能超出实际范围，和业务环境无关。

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Don’t get carried away and “retrain your development team because of five minutes of downtime”, said Squirrel, “but define tasks proportionate to the problem”.

不要鬼迷心窍，“不要因为系统停止工作5分钟就去重新培训你的整个开发团队”，Squirrel说道，“相反，你应该根据问题定义出相关的任务”。

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In terms preferred by economists, a situation defined by a principal-agent problem (such as you hiring a doctor or car mechanic who gets to both define your problem and figure out what to charge you for fixing it) was replaced by a much simpler employment relationship: would-be hustlers found themselves being turned into professional, generalist managers.

FORBES: Entrepreneurs are the New Labor: Part I

Not only does the author clearly define the problem, he proposes some unique solutions and ideas to train your dog quicker and keep both you, your carpet and Fido happy.

CNN: Site-Seer: Fetching an obedient dog from the Web