Co-author: Mike Kallet
The world of business is moving at an unprecedented pace. Technology is transforming faster than ever and organizations are evolving to survive. The most important resource organizations have to advance and outpace the competition is not technology, automation or real estate, it’s the people and more importantly their brainpower. The ability to engage and leverage employee knowledge, innovation and critical thinking is how organizations achieve excellence. Perhaps the least examined of these employee mental abilities is critical thinking. So how can leaders within organizations create an environment where employees can do their best critical thinking?
The first step leaders can use to create an environment for critical thinking is to provide clarity. Providing clarity is foundational to critical thinking – clearly defining the situation and ensuring each person is clear and aligned. Clear on the goal, clear on the tactics, clear on the strategy to reach that goal, clear on individual responsibilities, and clear on the why. When people are clear, they are more accountable, more engaged and focused, and have a common purpose. Clarity contributes to higher quality and fewer errors.
To assist in providing clarity, leaders can use two powerful tools, defining the why and understanding the impact. Defining the why can help leaders build buy-in as they create an environment for critical thinking. Why are we creating this product? Why are we discontinuing another? Why are we raising or lowering our price? Why are we re-organizing? Why didn’t I get that raise? Why is the budget allocated this way? The goal is for leaders to explain the reasoning behind why a decision was made in a way that people can understand. It doesn’t mean everyone will agree, but they will understand the context and rationale behind the decision.
Understanding the impact is the second tool leaders can use to provide clarity as they create an environment for critical thinking. Leaders ensure the impacts of decisions are identified and understood, not only the impacts on the business, but also the impacts on employees and their customers. What’s the impact, the value, and the consequence of this plan? How does this decision impact other initiatives? What’s the impact on all of our partners and stakeholders? By understanding the impact, team members are more likely to buy-in and give their full contribution. In creating an environment for critical thinking by providing clarity, defining the why and understanding the impact, leaders open the door for employees to comprehensively examine problems and design unique solutions.
After the environment for critical thinking is created, leaders draw out the best in their team members by becoming thinking coaches. A thinking coach is someone who gets others to think critically. To build a critical thinking organization, employees have to be skilled in the critical thinking process, and thinking coaches can create the roadmap. Thinking coaches don’t provide answers; they ask questions. One of the most common issues senior executives have is, “How do I get my team members to make more decisions themselves?” The answer is often very simple. They don’t make decisions themselves because they don’t have to. They come to you for help, and you tell them what they should do. Instead of providing answers, thinking coaches ask questions to draw out the knowledge within people, so they can answer their own questions. When an issue occurs and an employee passes the problem to the leader, a thinking coach will ask questions. What is the impact of this? How does that impact our customer or schedule? Why is this important? There are two significant benefits of being a thinking coach. First, although you have great ideas, your team members may have better ideas, or they may build off your idea to create something completely new. If you just tell people what to do, then you won’t discover new ideas. Second, as a thinking coach, you’re also teaching others what questions they should ask themselves the next time. With practice, your team members will start asking themselves and others the questions. Soon it will be common to hear them ask the questions of “why” and “what’s the impact”.
As a leader, if you want your team to think critically, you have to go first. Leaders model critical thinking in their day-to-day activities. How do you tackle hard problems? How do you communicate tough issues? How well do you use your subject matter experts? Here are initial steps to help cultivate critical thinking within your organization:
· Communicate the importance of critical thinking. Perhaps it’s because your customer base is changing or a new competitor has entered the market. Not only do you need to move quicker and more effectively than the competition, but you need to out-think them too.
· Demonstrate leadership support. The leaders of an organization need to actively sponsor and encourage critical thinking, making it safe to ask why, ask for clarity, and give support when someone calls a time-out because things are unclear.
· Model humility. Be humble and allow your employees to challenge your thinking. Be open to the possibility that your way may not be the most effective.
· Provide opportunities to develop critical thinking skills. Critical thinking is a learned skill. Ensure your team has the time and space to learn.
· Use critical thinking for both tactical and strategic issues. Use critical thinking to improve the organization day-to-day as well long-term.
· Make critical thinking necessary. Create openings for critical thinking. Ask others to share how they used critical thinking when they communicate their ideas and recommendations.
Critical thinking is a foundational toolset that can be applied to problem solving, decision making, innovation, and leadership. When individuals use critical thinking, their decisions improve, and the organization makes progress towards organizational excellence. To achieve this however, it takes more than leaders acting as thinking coaches, using the skills, talking about critical thinking throughout the organization, training people in the toolset, and encouraging their teams to use critically examine hard problems. To embed critical thinking into the organization, leaders must make it necessary to use the skills and tools by expecting their team members to think critically consistently, highlighting when they do, and identifying missed opportunities. As leaders and organizations grow in these skills, the benefits can be exponential, the entire organization improves, productivity goes up, quality goes up, and people are more engaged.
** This article is the seventh in a series of twelve addressing common leadership questions. These questions and challenges touch leaders at all levels and transcend industries. The article series provides valuable information and action steps for leaders to take their skills and teams to the next level. Click here to read the full series.
Author’s Note: Special thanks to Mike Kallet for his expertise in critical thinking and for his generous contribution in co-authoring this article.