(Edgecombe Community College: Tarboro, NC) -- Problem solving in manufacturing likely has been around since the first handmade tools were designed a couple million years ago.

But the phrase “problem solving” is relatively new, and so is its application in today’s world of business and industry. Edgecombe Community College (ECC) is leading education in this field by offering a training method called “Innovative Problem Solving with I-TRIZ.”

Edgecombe Community College is the first academic institution in North Carolina to offer I-TRIZ, a program designed by a Russian engineer and researcher during the 1940s. An acronym for a Russian phrase, TRIZ, in English, is commonly referred to as the “theory of inventive problem solving.”

In October, ECC conducted a pilot program headed by Randi Dikeman, Ph.D., director of customized training and work-force development at the college.

“It was a good pilot class,” Dikeman says. “We had a good cross-section of participants from business, health care, and education.”

 …