Introductory presentation on Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats method for thinking, creativity and innovation. I personally used to have such colored hats in my office and a DND sign...

1. Six Thinking Hats
By Edward De Bono
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Method for Thinking and Brainstorming – Hand Notes
Sharon Fridman (Fridy), Fridy@neustar.biz, @s_fridy, Oct 2007, v1.0

2. Agenda
• Introduction
• Thinking Methodology
• Presenting the Six Hats
• Q&A
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3. Introduction
• Thinking Process Basics
• What takes us beyond animals
• Cherry on the cream for mankind ability
• Those happy with their thinking are usually those whose thinking
purpose = proving they are right
• Success of self rather than the team
• Putting your thinking hat  Declarative intentional thinking
• Mixture & Confusion (facts, hope, balance, ego, charisma, me in
unit)  One at the time
• Six Hats Usage
• 1984 Olympiad (1 hour lecture) – Time magazine man of the
year
• NTT, IBM, DuPont, Ericsson, Shell, American Standard
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4. Approaches
• ~Western (with a slightly negative tone)
• State your opinion and fight!
• Ego – Win or lose – Listen in order to contradict
• Self confidence – “Charisma” - IMNSHO
• Hierarchy, Position, Politics
• Being argumentative and critical
• Dialectics can criticize what’s in front of you but not make
new offers
• ~Eastern (mainly Japanese, “beatified”)
• Open possibilities
• Separate the thinking person from the thinking matter itself
• No need to get down to earth to feel a fruitful idea
• Listening! Co-operation!
• “Operacy” = Doing and the involved thinking
• Goals, Priorities, Alternatives… 4

5. Six Hats - Basics
White Black Green
Tabula Rasa Dark Judge Growth
•Naturalism •Pessimism •New ideas
•Informative •Caution •Creativity
•Impartial •Critical Think •Options
Red Yellow Blue
Fire, Blood Sun Light Sky – “God”
•Emotions •Optimism •Calm - Order
•Intuition •Positivism •Control
•Feelings •Speculative •Observe
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6. 6

7. Reasoning
• Mapping / Scanning thinking – Proactive thinking
• Pretend to think - If it smells like shit…
• Avoiding Assumptions – Words can kill
• Avoiding Confusion – Concentrate on one aspect
• Diversity - Allow each perspective time and space
• Intention - Allow time for thinking and creativity
• Symbolism – non offensive thinking targeting
• Intuition and Feelings – Allowed (PMS for all)
• Balancing – Full palette, pairs, group-based
• Methods: Alone and in Group
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8. Technique
• Select a hat – “Customized” thinking
• Wear the hat – And role the dice… (Role playing)
• While wearing a hat your “self” is protected by the hat color!
• Instruct other/s (single/group) to wear a colored hat
• Focus only on certain aspects (shut up otherwise!)
• Force people to change their usual / preferred color
• All must use all (when needed) – Crucial to success
• Recommended Order (white / green / yellow / black / red) -
blue
• Needed point of view - On demand
• Training
• Deployment of that game in “easy” meetings to harvest on crisis
management, conflicts and dogmatism
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9. Advantages
• Defined and accepted role playing game – Rules
• Mapping and not confronting
• PIN – Positive / Interesting / Negative
• Protecting the ego/self…
• Focus on intention
• Conformable – To act, to ask, to be
• All speak the same language - Babelfishism
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10. White Board
•“Computer” – Natural, Objective - Scientist
•Facts on the table only
• No interpretation
• Focus
•However relevant information is possible even if not 100% -
Off-White thinking
•Is it actually a fact or an assumption from a confident man?
•2nd degree facts = “assumptionals” – Confidence level
•The white rule - No fact should be presented on a higher
degree of proof than it actually is
•No personal view is allowed in white hat!
• Discipline 10

11. White Hat (#2)
• Argument occasionally contains both facts and
subjective approach – separate the man from the boys!
• Western methodology show consequence and then
supporting evidence – Turn it around!
• Darwinism - Westerns hold opinions and persuade
others – the stronger survives!
• Japanese Style
• The meaning of a meeting is to listen
• No one has a perfect solution
• Spiral reordering of pieces of ideas to the solution
• Two columns
• Validated facts
• Non-validated “facts”
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12. White Hat – Ex.
 “In which factual territory do we live?”
 “Is it a validated fact?”
 “What information is lacking?”
 “What additional information we need?”
 “How can we obtain that information?”
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13. Red Hat (Chili Peppers)
•Emotions - Feelings – Intuition – Observations
•No need for logical grounds or explanations
•Non-Rational aspects can be revealed in a controlled
manner while painting the map
•Feeling should be taken into consideration when thinking
•Intuition as a complex experience based judgment – But
can be wrong and should be verified as such
•Personal views allowed as feeling (black/green support
other methods) if emotional driven
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14. Red Hat #2
•Relate to the conduct of the meeting as well in an
emotional way
•Must maintain artificiality in usage – so ideas stem from
the hat and not from ourselves…
•We can criticize without hurting, less need for powerful
wording, facing and mimics
•We can wear the mask and un-wear it at will
•Excessive use is forbidden and perilous
•“Is that offer acceptable had you initiated it?”
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15. Red Hat – Ex.
 “This is what I feel regarding the success of this
project…”
 “My stomach aches about this direction…”
 “I don’t like the way it has been done”
 “My intuition tells me we must have external API soon”
(too bad it didn’t…)
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16. Black Mist
•Negative but Logical – Pessimism - Focus on failures
•Criticisms (which is often black only) and judgmental
•Too much comfortable for most westerns – force them to
use it when needed ONLY
•Must stand to reason when written and not only when
presented by charismatic personality
•Must be separated from positivism (“fair” people usually give
some small insignificant disadvantages for their own opinion)
•NOT argumentative, nor emotional
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17. Black Hat #2
• No need to be “honest” and respect both sides
• No need for premature balancing
• Black hat limits negative-prone people!
• “Satan defense counsel”
• Find thinking mistakes presented by white hat
• Need a lot of imagination – Murphy's laws
• Show alternatives as proof to mishaps
• Risks – Fallacies – Pitfalls
• Negative-Speculative overall balancing
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18. Dealing with Afro-Americans…
1. Pinpoint, relate and recognize the weak points
2. Show views why the negative is unlikely – Cover black
with white Tipex
3. Admit the danger and prepare rescue plans
4. Deny the possibility – Black vs. Black!
5. Alternatives - Use yellow and green
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19. Black Hat #3
• Easy – Easy – Easy…
• Fast satisfaction denying others
• Approving of others make them superior?!?
• Hidden “Red Hat” syndrome
• Initial “Darwin” negative scan – Fear identification
• Yellow / Green BEFORE black
• Applicability
• Improve by pinpointing weaknesses
• Black does not initiate but reject
• So cannot be first claiming: If we passed black…
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20. Black Hat – Ex.
Basis:
 “Is the factual foundation solid?”
 “Are all derivatives do true consequences?”
 “Are there any other possible consequences?”
“What can go / be wrong?”
“Rules and regulations prohibit us from doing it”
“He has no experience in marketing”
“Last time that we raised prices – sales went down”
“What are the risks?”
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21. Yellow is Brave!
•Bright and optimistic (hope) – Balance to darkness
•Judgmental and not surrealistic – Speculation allowed
•Positive thinking – Being Constructive
• Curious – Search not only assessment
• “Greed” – What is the best possible scenario
• Initiator – Make things happen – Focus on action items
•Focus on advantages – both immediate and future
•Most people use this ONLY on their ideas, or beneficial to
them – No need for such motives
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22. Yellow Hat #2
• Reaction – Positive evaluation
• Solving problems
• Improvement – “TQM” like (there is always something
better out there)
• Taking chances – Opportunism
• Vision beyond positive-speculation
• No need to be “fancy” – Efficiency rather than innovation
(Greenish time…)
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23. Yellow Hat – Ex.
 “It will be efficient in the long run”
 “Is it possible that lowering the price will increase volume
and overall revenues?”
 “If…”
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24. Green Mile
• Creativity – Lateral thinking - Breaking of concepts
• Ideas – Let those seeds grow! And collect them
• Innovations – New horizons – Change
• Attitude – Intention – Break for creativity
• Yellow shed light in the dark – Green invent halogen!
• PO - Provocations – Stimulation - A-Symmetric
• Reversing / Runaway / Distortion / Exaggeration
• Mind Experiments - Prototyping
• MVP – Most valuable Perspective (Hat)
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25. Green Hat #2
• Need discipline and guidance – technique
• Variations – Alternation – Endless dissatisfaction
• Random Change (word) – Logic in absurd
• Concepts – Grouping – Generalize
• Challenge – Doubt – Any level is a good level but usually
stay on brief
• Active Movement – Lean forward rather than backward
• Layering
• Not linked associations
• Spring-Board
• First not best policy
• Not “Born” or genetic – Education!
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26. Green Hat – Ex.
 Basics:
 “What does this idea encapsulate?”
 “What is interesting in this idea?”
 “What is different in this idea?”
 “Where does it lead us?”
 Is there another way?
 Is there another explanation?
 Is there?
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27. Blue Chip
• Think about thinking
• Coordination – Management – Control - Order
• Calm – Cool – “Disconnected”
• Structure – Priorities – Direction
• Ask the right questions
• Focus on goals / problems / time / need / balance
• Must when “alone”
• Step by Step: Goal-Input-Solutions-Choose-Act
• Usually assign “Creative Directors”
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28. Blue Hat #2
• Strategy
• Products – Tasks – Protocol – Distribution
• Results – Conclusions – Responsibility
• Can share this hat and pass it
• Stop any arguments!
• Official
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29. Blue Hat – Ex.
 “What is the underlying problem?”
 “We need green thinking here”
 “Those tasks are assigned…”
 “We wasted too much time on finding whose to blame –
no more”
 “Can you give us the essence of your idea?”
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30. Exercises
•Identify your preferred hat?
•Colour pairing
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31. References
• Books by Edward de Bono
• “Six Thinking Hats”
• “Serious Creativity”
• “The Mechanism of Mind”
• Creativity Seminars
• Copywriting course
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32. E-Mail: Fridy@neustar.biz
Twitter: @s_fridy
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