There are too many concepts that apply to becoming a critical thinker to cover in an eight week term! At times, it felt like a family visit with relatives that I remember meeting before but had become unfamiliar with due to time and distance. Others times were like meeting a new person in a faraway place that you find out lived two houses away when you kids - familiar but still new. Both situations helped to solidify concepts that are simple to learn, but I expect will take a lifetime to master.
One of the big take-aways for me in the Critical Thinking course was the concept of forming the basis of decisions on the four-principle “Moral Compass”:
· Protect the customer (from your organization and himself)
· Serve the customer ( by helping sales or operations)
· Intelligently manage risk (by analyzing facts, data, and statistics)
· Seek continuous improvement
This concept alone was worth the price of admission.
The second concept that influenced me was the worker level diagram.
With a single picture, I recall not only the whole continuum of types of contributions team members can make in an organization, but of both the place I want to be in an organization, and the potential barriers to get there. Most important in my mind is that to stay at the decision level, it takes courage to make appropriate decisions using the Moral Compass principles.
The biggest point of all was really one of the simplest in the course. The whole concept of critical thinking is to gather, recognize, challenge assumptions, then evaluate before making a decision. As leaders, we are expected to apply critical thinking when it is appropriate. The challenge lies in determining when it is appropriate. To sum it all up:
Critical Thinking
Recognize, challenge assumptions
Decisions intelligently manage risk
Reasoned Analysis
