Six Thinking Hats

Beginning around the second half of the 20th century, some business leaders realized the deficiencies in the traditional “top-down” style of management, in which a small number of high-ranking individuals dictated orders for lower-ranking employees to carry out. They were responding to more general post-WWI sociocultural trends that questioned the value of old hierarchies and advocated for a more egalitarian approach in both business and politics. They gradually began to take a more collaborative approach to problem-solving, a method so entrenched that it is now the foundation of many advanced business education programs. Collaboration typically helps to ensure ownership of an issue or a business plan in addition to leveraging a variety of skills and ideas.

Collaborative Leaders Network, a nonprofit group, has identified nine stages of collaborative problem-solving. To begin, a team clarifies intentions, performs a background inquiry, and develops a process design. The team then launches the group who will work on the issue or issues by analyzing them, generating a range of options and solutions, evaluating those options to create a plan, producing documents to define the plan, and conducting an executive review.

De Bono asserts that the Six Thinking Hats method makes problem-solving more effective by separating out conflicting styles of thinking.