A Short Guide to Building Your Team’s Critical Thinking Skills
by Matt Plummer
Summary .
With critical thinking ranking among the most in-demand skills for job candidates , you would think that educational institutions would prepare candidates well to be exceptional thinkers, and employers would be adept at developing such skills in existing employees. Unfortunately, both are largely untrue.
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The Road to Success Is Paved With Critical Thinking
Critical thinking is one of the most in-demand skills in the workplace, yet, nearly half of employers rate their employees’ critical thinking skills as average or worse. This is due, in part, to the fact that there is little agreement around what critical thinking is exactly. Simply put, critical thinking is the process of analyzing information to get the best answer to a question or problem.
In reality, many employers lack an effective way to objectively assess critical thinking skills and countless managers don’t know how to provide specific instruction to team members in need of becoming better thinkers. Instead, managers often employ a sink-or-swim approach, ultimately creating work-arounds to keep those who can’t figure out how to “swim” from making important decisions.
What if we told you there is a better way? The professionals at Zarvana have developed the Critical Thinking Roadmap , a framework that breaks critical thinking down into four measurable phases: the ability to execute, synthesize, recommend, and generate. Within this detailed framework managers will learn:
- How to assess the critical thinking skills of each of your team members
- How to help those who are struggling
- How to recognize when a team member has mastered one phase and is ready for the next
Phase 1: EXECUTE
In this phase, team members simply do what they are asked to do. They complete all parts of their assignments on time and the quality of work is at or close to your professional standard. If a team member is struggling with this phase, make sure they understand your instructions by asking them to rearticulate each assignment before they begin. Provide clarity, if necessary, and consider breaking the assignment down into more manageable chunks. Once team members are making suggestions for how to improve their work, you know they’re ready for the next phase.
Phase 2: SYNTHESIZE
In this phase, team members learn to sort through a range of information and figure out what is important (such as summarizing the key takeaways after an important meeting). They should be able to identify and communicate all the important insights clearly and succinctly, while excluding all unimportant insights. Further, they should be able to accurately assess the relative importance of the important insights. You know team members are ready for Phase 3 when they can provide a summary of the important insights and implications for future work on the spot without preparation.
Phase 3: RECOMMEND
In this phase, team members move from identifying what is important to determining what should be done. When asking questions, they should be able to:
- Provide a recommendation backed by strong reasoning
- Demonstrate appreciation for the potential downsides of their recommendation
- Consider alternatives before reaching a final decision
Team members are ready to move to Phase 4 when they make reasonable recommendations that reflect sound business judgment on work that is not their own.
Phase 4: GENERATE
In this phase, team members become adept at translating the vision in others’ heads (and their own) into projects that can be executed. Many people don’t make it this far because they don’t give themselves permission to do the kind of open-ended thinking required. To help your team members move into this phase, ask them to keep a list of their ideas for improving a project, department, or organization and invite them to share those ideas with you regularly.
It’s time to reject the notion that critical thinking is either an innate gift that can’t be developed or a skill learned only through experience. Begin using this systematic approach to lead team members through the four phases of critical thinking. By doing so, you can help your team members develop one of today’s most in-demand skills.
Learning & Organization Development is offering the next Critical Thinking class on August 10th. You can register HERE .
References: Harvard Business Review (2019, October 11) Matt Plummer: A Short Guide to Building Your Team’s Critical Thinking Skills MasterClass (2021, May 25) MasterClass staff: Guide to Critical Thinking: Learn to Use Critical Thinking Skills Indeed (2021, June 9) Indeed Editorial Team: 6 Ways to Improve Critical Thinking at Work
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To teach others how to think smarter, you must have a simple, common way to define critical thinking that everyone can understand. We define critical thinking as providing a robust answer to a question. Building on this definition, we define 4 phases of critical thinking with 5 milestones per phase. This is the Critical Thinking Roadmap.
The Critical Thinking Roadmap Toolkit - published in Harvard Business Review - offers an unparalleled framework for how to develop your critical thinking skills for managers, leaders, information workers, and anyone who wants to feel, sound, and be smarter.
Zarvana trains your people to on today's most important soft skills, including time management, critical thinking, communication, and people management using research-based approaches and tools.
Oct 11, 2019 · Matt Plummer (@mtplummer) is the founder of Zarvana, which offers online programs and coaching services to help working professionals become more productive by developing time-saving habits ...
To demystify what critical thinking is and how it is developed, our team at Zarvana turned to three research-backed models: The Halpern Critical Thinking Assessment, Pearson’s RED Critical Thinking Model, and Bloom’s Taxonomy. Using these models, we developed the Critical Thinking Roadmap, a framework that breaks critical thinking down into ...
This document provides an overview of critical thinking skills and a roadmap for developing exceptional thinking abilities. It discusses the growing need for critical thinking in the workplace and challenges to learning how to think critically. A 4-phase model is presented for developing critical thinking skills: execute, synthesize, recommend, and generate. A roadmap tool is also included to ...
Jul 4, 2022 · The professionals at Zarvana have developed the Critical Thinking Roadmap, a framework that breaks critical thinking down into four measurable phases: the ability to execute, synthesize, recommend, and generate. Within this detailed framework managers will learn: How to assess the critical thinking skills of each of your team members
Mar 30, 2020 · To help managers and their teams develop these skills, our team at Zarvana turned to three research-backed models: The Halpern Critical Thinking Assessment, Pearson’s RED Critical Thinking Model ...
Nov 8, 2019 · The Power of Questions for Critical Thinking What Socrates discovered some 2,500 years ago was the power of questions to make others think. In his book Blink , Malcolm Gladwell shows that much of our thought life takes place behind the closed door of our subconscious.
Zarvana helps you out-think and out-perform your peers and competition using a science-based approach to train you to think smarter, work faster, & get better results. ... critical thinking ...