six hats

“The purpose of the Six Thinking Hats is to unscramble thinking, so that the thinker is able to use one thinking mode at a time.”
Edward de Bono

 

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“Thinking is the ultimate human resource. The main difficulty of thinking is confusion. We try to do too much at once. Emotions, information, logic, hope and creativity all crowd in on us”. The Six Thinking Hats allow us to conduct our thinking as a conductor might lead an orchestra. The hats help the users to be objective and non-contentious. They make it possible for the “Blue Hat” moderator to ask participants to change their thinking mode, allocate timeframes and guide the process to its completion. Systematic, disciplined design thinking from start to finish.

Schembri

Imagen:  Brian Schembri, Conductor
www.brianschembri.com

APPLICATIONS OF 6 THINKING HATS

Productivity: Rank Xerox: ‘Using the de Bono Techniques we achieved in less than a day what would have taken us a week’

Total Quality Management: ‘ I feel Six Hats should be positioned at the forefront of TQM movements and business improvement teams since the process improves the quality of thinking’.

Customer Service: British Airways: ‘It has focused our attention on how to exploit the creativity of our staff…to develop new ways to improve service and better understand our customers’.

Product Development: Prudential INSURANCE: Our key professionals have improved the quality of our thinking…essential in moving our product range forward into the twenty-first century’.

Management Style: Conco: ‘Six Hats is the missing link between understanding the different styles of thinking and constructively using them’.

Collaboration/Temwork: Labatts: ‘It has enabled people to improve day-to-day operations and contribute to reduction in stress, turmoil and resistance to change’.

Democracy: Federal Express (Couriers) commented: ‘It honours all thinking preferences…everyone can participate and contribute…ideas can be holistically viewed and fine-tuned.’

From the VP of Sales for a Sport Broadcasting Company:

“The introduction of de Bono’s ‘Six Hats’ parallel thinking technique, modified for application to the selling process, was extremely well-received. In fact, I have already had positive feedback from our staff on their immediate and successful efforts to use this training in selling situations.

This certainly testifies to the benefit they felt was derived because, as you know, sales people generally steer clear of meetings of any kind! I have been to a variety of sales training seminars in the last 25 years, but find this approach, as customized to suit our products, to be one of the most valuable and practical of any that I have come across. I would recommend its customized use for any of our broadcast sales teams.”