Part of the Problem !

When i was in my early years of my IT job, there used to be a forward which was supposed to illustrate the difference between being a part of the problem and being a part of the solution. The story goes like this -> US and then USSR were in a race to invent a pen that would work even in zero gravity . USA used the latest techniques to invent an ink that worked, while USSR just used a pencil to write in space ! This was given as an example , where US was thinking about the problem and not the solution.

To put it bluntly, this example sucks big time. Not only is this example bad, but also is inappropriate. The above example at best could have been fit for lateral or concept-fan thinking , popularized by edward de bono. Concept-fan , because instead of asking ' Whats the ink that would work in a zero gravity?' , the russians asked ' what is that which would help me write in space '?

Being a part of problem , i believe is something else and i felt it quite recently. Recently it so happened that one of the servers that my Tech support manages was shut down without any prior notice. Due to this , we did lose couple of days as the App servers got corrupted. Now the problem is two-fold ,

1) How do i compensate for the days lost ?

2) How do i solve this problem in future ? Who can solve this ?

But the problem became multi-fold , when somehow , without my conscious effort my mind started pondering over other things . Im not the reason for the problem in the first place and im just supposed to solve the problem by assigning it to a competent fellow. But , what happened is this -> I approached the issue with a perception of ' Im responsible for everything and i made a mistake ' . As a result , all the interactions i had with the team members were tainted by this perception . I failed to think to solve the problem , but started thinking about how my supervisors would assess me . So apart from the original problem , my mind augumented it with its own , due to its desires, perceptions, fears , feelings , past impressions . In the end , the problem became bigger and i was part of the problem .

Plain stupid !