Staight lines. And Angles.

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line. I am not going to debate this. When applied to the sport of boxing, this principle indicates that a fighter can maximize his chance of hitting his opponent by throwing his punch in a direct and straight line. This straightforward action, however, doesn’t take into account a basic strategy of any match: the opponent moves. He bobs, and weaves and each straight line punch is dodged and ducked. This is when the fighter needs to add angles to those straight lines in order to be effective. 

Similarly, it seems well and good, and rational to say the least, to tackle a problem straight on. Identify the root cause and take the straight line approach to addressing it. However, "straight on" is relative to the point of origin, which gives us the angle. The angle you take in your approach is as important as your straight line.  This can be applied in the workplace when you hear “we’ve tried that before and it didn’t work.” If the original straight line approach fails, do not give up. Add an angle, or change the angle, and try again. 

Problem solving is never black and white, so in order to be effective, you always have to consider all of the angles. Only then can you identify the right one, or the closest one to it, and go for the knockout.