Approach divide-and-conquer in a three-step process.

Divide/Break

Breaking the problem into smaller sub-problems.Sub-problems should represent a part of the original problem. This step generally takes a recursive approach to divide the problem until no sub-problem is further divisible.At this stage, sub-problems become atomic in nature but still represent some part of the actual problem.

Conquer/Solve

A lot of smaller sub-problems to be solved.

Merge/Combine

This stage recursively combines them until they formulate a solution of the original problem.