Problem Lab

The Problem Lab is here to help University of Waterloo students, faculty and staff identify and understand important problems. The goal is to increase the ability of the University of Waterloo community to create innovations of greater economic and social consequence.

Attempts at innovation frequently fail because either the innovation is not important enough to be widely adopted, or the problem is poorly understood. The Problem Lab helps you address both issues.

We ask questions about the problem, not the solution. Is it really important? Why is it really important? Do we understand the problem thoroughly? Have we identified the underlying problem, instead of a superficial one? How has the problem arisen? Why have others failed to solve this problem?

We should do all this before we ask ourselves how we might solve it.