Values Of The Six Thinking Hats example essay topic

Decision-Making Model Analysis Paper Throughout this paper, the values of the Six Thinking Hats will be discussed and the meanings behind the Six Hats. Six Thinking Hats' is "used to look at decisions from a number of important perspectives. This forces you to move outside your habitual thinking style, and helps you to get a more rounded view of a situation (de Bono, 1985) ". There are five values behind the Six Thinking Hats. They are role-playing, attention direction, convenience, possible basis in brain chemistry, and rules of the game. Decision-making can be difficult, but these are decisions that are made after all the information has been provided beforehand.

White Hat "White hat is neutral and objective. The white hat is concerned with objective facts and figures (de Bono, 1985) ". The purpose of the white hat is to focus on the data available. Look at the information given and see what can be learned from it. The person requesting the information should use focusing questions in order to obtain information or information gaps. White hat thinking is a discipline and a direction.

The thinker has to strive to be more neutral and objective in the presentation of the information. Red Hat "Red hat suggests anger (seeing red), rage and emotions. The red hat gives the emotional view (de Bono, 1985) ". When a thinker is using the red hat there should never be any attempt to justify the feelings or to provide a logical basis for them.

The purpose of the red hat is to look at problems using intuition, gut reaction, and emotion. With the red hat, this allows the thinker to say; "This is how I feel about the matter". Black Hat "Black is gloomy and negative. The black hat covers the negative aspects - why it cannot be done (de Bono, 1985) ".

With the black hat all the bad points of a decision has to be taken into consideration. This is the hat where the weak points are looked at my closely. This is the time when contingency plans are prepared and placed into order. The black hat points out risks, dangers, or faults in a design. The black hat is not argument, it is just an objective attempt to put negative elements on the table. Yellow Hat "Yellow hat is sunny and positive.

The yellow hat is optimistic and covers hope and positive thinking (de Bono, 1985) ". The yellow hat helps think positive and constructive. Yellows symbolizes sunshine, brightness and optimism. The yellow hat is concerned with positive feedback. Yellow hat is concerned with making things happen. It covers a positive spectrum that ranges from the logical and practical at one end to dreams, visions and hopes at the other end.

Green Hat "Green hat is grass, vegetation and abundant, fertile growth. The green hat indicates creativity and new ideas (de Bono, 1985) ". With the green hat there is a need to go beyond the known and the obvious and the satisfactory. The green hat thinking seeks to move forward from an idea in order to reach a new idea. The word provocation is used to take us out of the usual patterns of thinking.

With the creative pause the green hat thinker pauses at any given point to consider whether there might be alternative ideas at that point. Blue Hat "Blue hat is cool, and it is also the color of the sky, which is above everything else. The blue hat is concerned with control and the organization of the thinking process. Also the use of the other hats (de Bono, 1985) ". The blue hat is like the conductor of the orchestra. The blue hat calls for the use of the other hats.

The blue hat sets the focus, defines the problem and shapes the questions. Blue hats are also responsible for summaries, overviews and conclusions. Even though the blue hat role is assigned to one person, it is still open to anyone to offer comments and suggestions. The six thinking hats method is designed to switch thinking away from the normal argument style to a map making style.

The purpose of six thinking hats is role-playing, attention direction, convenience, possible basis in brain chemistry and rules of the game. One of the main restrictions on thinking is our ego. With the hat it allows us to say things we would not normally say because risking our egos. So that is how role-playing falls into play. We are putting on a costume that gives us full permission to express our thoughts and feelings. The second value is attention direction.

With the six thinking hats, that gives the thinker the opportunity to move from one aspect to another. The third value is convenience. The six thinking hats makes things much more convenience. The thinker has the option and including everyone else to switch gears spontaneously.

One moment the thinker can be negative, or positive, creative or emotional. The fourth value is possible basis in brain chemistry. With this value the thinker is able to go beyond there own present state of knowledge. The fifth value is the rules of the game. If people understand the rules of the game beforehand then this will make map making as distinct from argument.

My decision-making example is based on the "Six Thinking Hats" designed by Edward De Bono. Within my organization, we have weekly organizational meetings with all employees. The purpose of these meetings is to brainstorm and come together on solutions that will benefit the company. But the problem that we have as an organizational is "overstepping". Meaning everyone has to talk at the same time, seems like no one can agree or something someone said was taken offensive. These meetings would truly frustrate me because with all this commotion going on no one heard what the next person said.

We have tried several approaches to help with the organization of the meeting but every solution seems to fail. So it was brought to the CEOs attention to do the "Six Thinking Hats" decision-making model to help us with the organization of our meetings. But as the CEOs assistant, it was my job to get this six thinking hat process started. This was a very difficult ordeal with these people. So for me to prepare everyone for this new process, I needed to prepare myself first. So I designed a layout of how I wanted the organizational meeting to operate.

At out first organizational meeting I handed out the normal layouts we used but this week I told everyone it was going to be a little different in making decisions. Below is the layout I design as part of our organizational agenda. The purpose of the different color hats is so that with each hat is up for discussion then decisions can be made at that point. For us to determine who will speak first, if you are wearing that hat color that we are discussing then that person will have the option to speak first regarding there opinion. If there are more than one person with that color on, then the person who has more red, or black or yellow etc. on then he or she goes first. Beside each hat the decision that we came up with as a group will be written down.

Conclusion The purpose of the six thinking hats is allowing a thinker to deal with one thing at a time. Instead of having to take care of emotions, logic, information, hope and creativity all at the same time. Being able to deal with them separately helps to come up with a more successful outcome. When thinking is clear and simple, it becomes more enjoyable and more effective.

Bibliography

De Bono, E., Six Thinking Hats. (1985) MICA Management Resources, Inc.
Toronto, Ontario Mind Tools. Six Thinking Hats. (1995).