the gapanese invasion is nigh!

"pinakamaganda ka nga sa buong kapuluan, pero latina na naman ang magwawagi ng korona at sash sa miss world! racism ba ito? lupasay!"

Sunday, July 22, 2007

single problem, multiple solutions


Six Thinking Hats shows how to look at a decision from different views. The ‘Six Thinking Hats” technique shows six such different styles of thinking using the metaphor of hats. Wearing the White Hat can help me concentrate on the data available. I can look at the information I have and see what I can learn from it. I can look for gaps in my knowledge, trying either to fill them or to take them into account. This thinking can help me analyze past trends and use these data to understand the present trends. Wearing the red hat can help me look at problems using gut reaction, instinct and emotion. I can try to think how others will react emotionally. I can also try to understand the responses of people who do not fully understand my reasoning. Wearing the black hat can help me look at all bad points of the decision. I can look at the decision cautiously and defensively. I try to see why this decision might not work. This way, I can highlight my plan’s weak points and erase them, change them and ready contingency plans to counter them. Wearing the yellow hat helps me think positively. It helps me see all the benefits of the decision and the value in it. It helps me keep going when everything looks negative and difficult. Wearing the green hat can help me develop creative solutions to a problem. In can help me think freely without my ideas being heavily criticized. Wearing the blue hat can help me do process control. When alternative plans are necessary, I can direct activity into black hat thinking. When ideas are lacking, I can direct activity into green hat thinking.
The book is important for it helps me look at key decisions from a number of different views. I used to think that major decisions come from the general use of human reason. It helps me make better decisions by forcing me to move outside this usual way of thinking. I can make decisions using my intuition. I can also make decisions using fallback plans. I can even make decisions using a change in thinking strategy. Because of this, the book helps me understand the complexity of my decision. It is neither simple nor singular so it offers many solutions. It also helps me find problems and opportunities that I might be blind to if I went with my habitual thinking.
The insights are useful because I thought that only rational and positive thinking brought forth success. This is not entirely untrue. However, this is not all the reason for success. Instead, it is just a part of it. The book offers that the problem may also be looked from an emotional, instinctive, creative or negative view. This means that success may also be had even when plans are resisted, when less popular options are chosen or when alternative plans are followed. Say, I have a plan of detouring to avoid the traffic jam and to get home for my daily rituals. Nonetheless, this plan backfires when I get caught in a graver traffic jam. I can save the day by using other solutions while in this problem. Perhaps, I can start my daily ritual by starting my study time, browsing notes and answering homework in the car. I can also ask the driver to make it to the nearest U-turn, feeling that other roads are more accessible. Whatever thinking hat I may wear, it helps my reasoning in accomplishing my desired goals.
As a student, in my personal life and in my future profession, I experience problems. I may use the insights from the book to solve problems in brand new ways. I may look at my problems with the “Six Thinking Hats” technique. Then, I will be able to solve them using all approaches. My decisions and plans will combine ambition, skill, sensitivity, creativity and alternative planning. My decision and plans in school will help me achieve more if my reasoning arrives at a decision coupled with my gut feel or creative imagination. My decision and plans in my personal life will improve if I do not limit my decision in one general scope that is most likely rational. It helps too if I involve contingency planning in each decision-making process. In the future as a professional, I will not take the risk of using just one approach to corporate problems. Instead, I will look at the problem at all angles, hoping to find ways to the right solution. Seeing the problem at all available points is necessarily resorting to the “Six Thinking Hats” technique.
I may be able to apply the “Six Thinking Hats” technique today and everywhere my decision matters, from my classes to my dealings with my family, friends and other people. My correct solution to each encountered problem creates an impact in my life as well as others’. Thus, I cannot leave my decision to a single chance when lots of options offer different possibilities. The “Six Thinking Hats” proves that these options are indeed possible.

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