What is Critical Thinking?

How you look at and analyze information to make a reasonable judgement is probably the easiest way to explain critical thinking. What we have noticed is that emotion gets in the way of 90% of staff to use critical thinking to come up with solutions. The other 9% is that staff are stuck in their own head to use critical thinking to make a decision. Then there is the 1% that have the ability.

Of course, we exaggerate this to make a point. A lot of decisions in business need to start coming from systems and processes. All plans are meant to change, but the process that you put in place some time ago came from a level-headed playing field of decision making. What most staff need to do, is go back to the plan and come up with their decisions for the long term. This way decisions are not made in the heat of the moment or strictly based on how you have always done it.

How Do You Increase Your Critical Thinking?

Critical thinking comes from life, work or learned (school) experience. When you add personalities on top of the experience, you have varied ways of critical thinking. Everyone is different, and how they perceive reality is different. Hence, critical thinking is different for everyone.

To create a better critical thinking process, we have labelled some ideas below;

Clarity – when making decisions you need to have clarity of what you are making a decision on. A lot of people will be coming to you with their side of the story. You need to be clear in your understanding and decision making.
Research – always get both sides to a story. Always continue to research until you can make an informed decision. Don’t always go back to the same resources, Google is a wonderful thing!
Comparison – compare stories and research and what will work better for you in the decision-making process
Conversation – everyone works much better when they can talk out issues, and it gives you the decision-maker more information to work from
Evaluation – create an evaluation matrix to making a decision. Part of this matrix will be the pros and cons.
Questions – when you are not clear on making a decision, ask as many questions as you need to.

What Is the Importance of Critical Thinking?

Too many decisions are made today without the proper analysis that serves the best interest of all parties.

When a person can harness the skill of critical thinking, there are several important traits that come to mind;

Decision Making – you become much better at decision making over time. People begin trusting you to make well-informed decisions for the betterment of everyone around you.

Career Options – supervisors will want you to move up in the company. And if they don’t, the more respect you earn now will lead you to potential opportunities outside of your existing company.

Well-Formed Answers – your answers will be filled with well-researched information that causes others to have no negative criticism towards it.

Gain Respect – your peers will respect you more with decision making that comes from facts and not rumours

Informed – you are staying up to date with what is needed in the future.

In short, stop relying on others to think for you. Critical thinking being used wisely can then lead you to further opportunities. How you think and act in your own life, will give you your own results. In a world of easy access, we are the creators of our own path.

No one will carve it for you.

For any help needed when making decisions, feel free to reach out to our team at Future to Now Consulting and one of our consultants will be glad to discuss more with you.