Nick, Tell them one word...GOOGLE!  

The main thing here is the person must contain the skillset to be able to 
"troubleshoot" an issue.  Some people in IT do not contain this Skill which is 
difficult to have them move past.  But if there is an issue that I am having 
trouble with, almost any issue I can find some type of hint/resolution by 
simply typing the error or Tivoli error code into Google.  We actually have a 
troubleshooting checklist which I recommend you create which contains all of 
the basic techniques that should be followed.  Before something gets "punted" 
up, have them go through the "troubleshooting" checklist.

Matthew J. Leonard
Network Infrastructure Administrator
AtlasAir Worldwide Holdings
Matthew.Leonard AT AtlasAir DOT com
Office: 914.701.8715


-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On Behalf Of 
Nick Laflamme
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2012 8:25 AM
To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
Subject: [ADSM-L] Teaching Problem Solving?

Slightly OT, but I expect this might resonate with some of us.

How do you teach someone to solve problems? How do you teach them to look past 
the first symptom (or the user's problem description) to gather all the 
symptoms and determine if a common cause might cause many of the symptoms? 

We've got some contractors are are TSM-certified but lack this skill of looking 
past the first symptom. I really need to tune up their problem solving skills 
so they handle more incidents themselves without punting to us all the time. 

Help?

Nick