Six Thinking Hats

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18 May 2007 5 Comments

Six Thinking Hats, by Edward De Bono, presents a framework for organizing and improving thinking.

Key Take Aways
Here are my key take aways:

By switching hats, you can switch points of view.
It’s easier to ask somebody to wear another hat, than tell them to change their thinking
You can reduce time in meetings spent arguing towards constructive dialogue
You can better balance thinking, particuarly in a group (for example, creatitivity with negativity or emotional perspective with facts, particuarly)

Six Hats
The six hats are:

White Hat – the facts and figures
Red Hat – the emotional view
Black Hat – the “devil’s advocate”
Yellow Hat – the positive side
Green Hat – the creative side
Blue Hat – the organizing view

Switch Hats to Switch Your Thinking
By using a metaphor, the hat, it’s easy to switch modes of thinking by switching hats. The main idea is to turn destructive arguments into constructive thinking. The approach is to have people wear a certain hat depending on what type of thinking is needed for the moment

Key Themes
Key themes throughout the book are:

Thinking your way forward over judging your way forward.
Parallel thinking over argument, adversarial, and confrontational.
Setting direction for thinking over describing what perspective your thinking was.

5 Comments »

Anonymous said:

Did you know there is an official training course and certification in this thinking method? Learn more here: http://www.debonoconsulting.com/Six_Thinking_Hats.asp

You can also buy the book at this site: http://www.debonoconsulting.com/deBonoConsulting_Store.asp

# 23 April 2008 at 3:06 pm

J.D. Meier said:

I think it’s a great technique.

I’ve found a way to make it effective at work. When a meeting gets stuck, I list a question for each hat on the board:
* What are the facts and figures?
* What’s your gut reaction? How do you feel about this?
* Why can’t we do this? What prevents us? What’s the downside?
* How can we do this?
* What are additional opportunities?
* How should we think about this? (what are the metaphors or mental models)

We then walk the questions as a team, with each other vs. against each other.

# 31 May 2008 at 1:58 am

No Person | Books | Insight. Inspiration. Impact. said:

[...] Involve them in the solution. Ask them to temporarily wear a collaborative hat. It makes it safe for them to play out your ideas, and temporarily step out of their No Person behavior. See Six Thinking Hats. [...]

# 27 September 2008 at 7:28 pm

Cooperative Controversy Over Competitive Controversy | Books | Insight. Inspiration. Impact. said:

[...] Wear a hat. The most effective technique I’ve found to help a group use cooperative controversy is to “wear a hat.” The team puts on their Devil’s advocate hat and beats the idea up toether. We then wear another hat to work together to figure out ways we can make the idea work. The hat makes it comfortable for people to switch perspectives. This is along the lines of Six Thinking Hats. [...]

# 27 September 2008 at 7:48 pm

Thinking as a Skill - Sources of Insight said:

[...] Six Thinking Hats [...]

# 28 July 2009 at 11:52 pm