This document provides an introduction to the Six Thinking Hats framework developed by Edward de Bono. The Six Hats include White (facts), Yellow (optimism), Black (caution), Green (creativity), Red (intuition), and Blue (process control). Each hat represents a different thinking perspective or role. The framework is intended to separate types of thinking, avoid groupthink, promote parallel thinking, and structure conversations and decision making. The document outlines the purpose and use of each hat, provides examples, and discusses considerations for effective versus ineffective implementation of the Six Hats approach.

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Six Thinking Hats
Practical Use Review
John Canfield
13 October 2017

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Audience:
Project
Management
Professionals
Balancing Projects
Motivating Management

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John Canfield – Speaker Introduction
Helping Clients Build High Performance Teams Since 1990
John Canfield is an experienced business executive and coach who has been
trained to facilitate a wide variety of
Planning,
Improvement Strategies,
Creativity & innovation
John has many years of experience working and consulting in a wide variety of
organizations around the world.
Prior to 1990 John was a Senior Engineering Manager for Intel Corporation and
later Director of Corporate Quality and Design Research for Herman Miller.
John has a BA from Williams College (Political Science, Psychology) and a
BS from University of Minnesota (Mechanical Engineering)

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Presentation Outline
PMI PMBOK Support: Chapter 2
2.4 Key General Management Skills
1. Strategic, tactical, operational planning
2. Organizational structures and behaviors
3. Managing work relationships
4. Managing oneself

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Presentation Outline
PMI PMBOK Support: Chapter 2
2.4 Key General Management Skills
2.4.1: Leading
2.4.2: Communicating
2.4.3: Negotiating
2.4.4: Problem solving
2.4.5: Influencing the organization

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Decision Making – Primary Work Purpose
Simply and fundamentally, the success of a business
depends on what gets done by everyone–both the
leaders and the employees.
And nothing gets done if decisions aren’t made.
Decisions are the stepping-stones to action.
Decisions have little impact without buy-in.
Our goal today is learn how to build great decisions
AND great buy-in..
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Ideas
Know – Share
Know - Don’t Share
Knew – Forgot
New - Thought for the first time ever
Performance and Thinking
WHAT: IDEA HUNT
Part of our work is to get as many good ideas as possible to be part of our conversation.
You cannot realize what you cannot imagine.
You cannot will yourself a new idea
We are on an idea search, scavenger hunt for alternatives. As the iceberg- diagram
below attempts to show, not all the ideas we’d like to consider are above water, on the
table, available to be discussed.

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Scene of the Crime
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Six thinking hats - introduction
Six Thinking Hats
White Hat: information known or needed
Yellow Hat: Optimism, values and benefits, why it will work
Black Hat: Judgment, devils advocate, why it will not work, risk
assessment
Green Hat: Possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas
Red Hat: Feelings, hunches, intuition - legitimizes emotions and
feelings
Blue Hat: Managing the thinking process - the "control hat"

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Ideas
Know – Share
Know - Don’t Share
Knew – Forgot
New - Thought for the first time ever
Part of our work is to get as many good ideas as possible to be part of our
conversation.
• You cannot realize what you cannot imagine.
• You cannot will yourself a new idea
We are on an idea search, scavenger hunt for alternatives. As the iceberg- diagram below
attempts to show, not all the ideas we’d like to consider are above water, on the table, available
to be discussed.
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Six thinking hats - introduction

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Collaboration - Behavior and Thinking Options
Cooperative Support
Effective
Decision
+
+
-
-
Compete
Avoid Accommodate
Collaborate
Compromise
Low ability to
handle conflict,
ie manage
options
Some one
wins…
High ability to
handle conflict, ie
manage options
Best idea wins !

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Affinity Diagram
Benchmarking
Big Picture – Heuristic Redefinition
Brainstorming
Business Environment Analysis
Cause/Effect Diagram
Charter
Creative Thinking Skills
Cross Functional Process Map
Culture and Behaviors
Customer Research
Decision Matrix
Five Dysfunctions of a Team
Force Field Diagram
Gantt Chart
Great Team Traits
Impact/Ease Diagram
Improvement Process
Interrelationship Digraph
Kano Model
Leading Change
Meeting Process
Moments of Truth
Multivoting
Need a Team?
P/R Measurements
Pareto Diagram
Process Decision Program Chart
Process Flow Chart
Prioritizing Process
Purpose, Vision, Goals, Strategies & Plans
Relationship Diagram
Relationship Strategies
Scoreboard
Show Me the Money – Cost Benefit Analysis
Show Me the Money – Continued
Six Thinking Hats (de Bono)
Smart Criteria
Stage Theory - Stages of Team Growth
Storyboard
Systematic Diagram - Tree Diagram
Value Chain
Waste Search
Workflow Diagram
Work Room Set up
GOOD THINKING TOPICS - PERSPECTIVES ON THINKING
COLLABORATION TOOLS, QUESTIONS
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Using current skills and methods, select an issue as
a team, make a decision, and debrief how your
approach works.
goal: more family time
solution: four day work week
or
goal: eliminate downtown auto gridlock
solution: no cars allowed downtown
How would you normally handle this task?
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Exercise debrief - How did it go?
1. What process did you use?
2. Who got heard?
3. What is your decision?
4. Percent of your team supporting the decision?
5. Satisfaction with meeting?
6. Differences from previous meetings?
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Introduction
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Six Thinking Hats and Lateral Thinking
have been developed by Dr. Edward
de Bono, regarded by many as the
leading international authority on the
direct teaching of creative thinking.
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Six thinking hats - introduction

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De Bono Approach: Intelligence and Thinking
Intelligence and thinking are different.
Intelligence is our innate capability, what we’re
born with.
Thinking, on the other hand, is how we learn to
use our intelligence, and as such, is a skill.
Six thinking hats - introduction

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What “operating system”
are you using?
Why would you upgrade
your operating system
on the same hard disk?
.
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Six thinking hats - introduction
Six Thinking Hats
White Hat: information known or needed
Yellow Hat: Optimism, values and benefits, why it will work
Black Hat: Judgment, devils advocate, why it will not work, risk
assessment
Green Hat: Possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas
Red Hat: Feelings, hunches, intuition - legitimizes emotions and
feelings
Blue Hat: Managing the thinking process - the "control hat"

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White Hat (STH 25 - 46)
information known or needed
- neutral and objective
- pure facts and figures
- imitates the computer
- first class facts, checked and proven
- second class facts, believed to be true
- identifies information that is missing
Introduce the Hats

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Yellow Hat (STH 89 - 114)
Optimism, values and benefits, why it will work
- symbolizes sunshine, brightness and optimism
- positive and constructive
- probes and explores for value and benefit
- strives to find logical support
- speculative and opportunity seeking
- permits visions and dreams
- measure against your scoreboard
Introduce the Hats

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Black Hat (STH 71 - 88)
Judgment, devils advocate, why it will not work,
risk assessment
- caution, not argument
- critical negative judgment, risk analysis
- logical reasons must be given
- points out dangers and potential problems
- points out faults in a design
- measure against your scoreboard
Introduce the Hats

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Green Hat (STH 115 - 144)
Possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas
- supported by Lateral Thinking skills and tools
- symbolizes fertility, growth and the value of seeds
- creative thinking, the search for alternatives
- does not have to be logical
- movement replaces judgment
- moves from one idea to reach other ideas
- generates new concepts and new perceptions
Introduce the Hats

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Red Hat (STH 47 - 70)
Feelings, hunches, intuition - legitimizes emotions
and feelings
- "this is how I feel"
- fears, dislikes, loves, hates
- the opposite of neutral, objective information
- keep it short - no need to give reasons for the basis
- allows exploring the feelings of others
Introduce the Hats

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Blue Hat (STH 145 - 169)
Managing the thinking process - the "control hat"
- the orchestra conductor
- organized the thinking
- "thinking about the thinking needed to explore the subject"
- calls for the use of the other hats
- sets the focus, defines the problems and shapes the
questions
- responsible for summaries, overviews, and conclusions
Introduce the Hats

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Six Thinking Hats
Practical Uses
Evaluate an alternative
Suspend judgment
Ask questions to provide information you may not have
thought to request
Reduce time and angst
Promote and provoke dialogue
Introduce the Hats

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Using Six Thinking Hats, work through the exercise
#1 issue as a team, make a decision, and debrief
how the Six Hats approach works.
10 Minutes
WHITE 2 minutes
YELLOW 2 minutes
BLACK 2 minutes
GREEN 2 minutes
RED 30 seconds
BLUE 2 minutes
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Exercise debrief - How did it go?
Six Thinking Hats process
1. White Hat – Know or want to know?
2. Yellow Hat – Good idea?
3. Black Hat – Bad idea?
4. Green Hat – Options
5. Red Hat – Intuition, gut?
6. Blue Hat – Next Steps?
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Exercise debrief - How did it go?
1. What process did you use?
2. Who got heard?
3. What is your decision?
4. Percent of your team supporting the decision?
5. Satisfaction with meeting?
6. Differences from previous meetings?
Six thinking hats - introduction

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Imagine a meeting of people in a conference room.
Six Thinking Hats and parallel thinking
REVIEW THE HATS

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Used correctly
The process encourages people to separate fact from
opinion, to look fully at both positive and negative
opinions and to get hidden agendas that can sabotage
any meeting on the table.
It stimulates their innate creativity and helps them
discover how to turn seemingly insoluble problems into
real opportunities.
review the Hats

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Used correctly
Each meeting participant uses the same hat color at the
same time together. Used correctly, the hats keep your
different kinds of thinking separated, focused and
controlled.
Incorrect use would have each person with their own
different color hat sharing their ideas only when their hat
is being considered. Using the Six Hats simultaneously is
chaos.
review the Hats

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Used incorrectly
I often see untrained teams assigning one hat color
to one person
and asking that person to represent that hat concurrently
with the other hats.
Here each hat does get represented but it does lend
itself to a argument among the six hats. The purpose of
the hat color is to solicit those types of ideas, one type at
a time.
review the Hats

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Used incorrectly
I often see untrained teams trying to assign a hat
color to a personality.
“Oh, Bob is so black hat, such a naysayer.” While people
may have tendencies personally, they likely exercise all
six types of ideas during their workdays. The effective
use of the hats focuses on using the hats to solicit lots of
ideas in all the colors.
review the Hats

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Used incorrectly
I often see untrained teams using the hats to provide
them an opportunity to present their opinion.
The yellow hat people go first, then the black hat people,
etc. So the hats are separated, but this lends itself to
having people associate themselves and their opinions
with one color and wait till their color is requested.
review the Hats

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Used Correctly
One way to set up the sequence to avoid this inclination is to say, “If
someone (not just you) really liked this idea (yellow hat) what would
they be thinking and writing on their post its?”
“If someone (not just you) really did not like this idea (black hat)
what would they be thinking and writing on their post its?” Here I am
working hard to get all the ideas possible for each hat so they are
available to the whole team to consider (junk drawer).
review the Hats

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Six Thinking Hats
Deeper Dive
Additional
Considerations
Recommendations

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Six Thinking Hats
White Hat: information known or needed
Red Hat: Feelings, hunches, intuition - legitimizes emotions and
feelings
Black Hat: Judgment, devils advocate, why it will not work, risk
assessment
Yellow Hat: Optimism, values and benefits, why it will work
Green Hat: Possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas
Blue Hat: Managing the thinking process - the "control hat"
Six hats – considerations, recommendations

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White Hat Support
SMARTR criteria to write useful objectives:
S – Specific: Are we clear about what is to be done? Clearly states the
expected outcome or result for which an employee will be held
accountable. The outcome is linked to overall business objectives.
M – Measurable: How will we know if it has been achieved? States the
criteria that will be used to measure performance and make
sure that the objective has been accomplished.
A – Accountable: Do we have the capabilities to be successful? Falls
within an employees primary area of responsibilities.
R – Realistic: Reasonable chance of achievement.
T – Time bound: When does it have to be completed? States the
specific time frame in which it is to be accomplished.
R – Resources: What’s needed to succeed?

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Decision Matrix
Options Quality Cost Deliv Innov Support $ Total
Loan
Request
Process
3 2 3 1 2 1 12
Loan
Review
Process
3 4 5 1 3 1 17
Credit
Check
Process
5 6 1 4 4 3 22
YELLOW AND BLACK HAT SUPPORT

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Green Hat
Lateral Thinking is listed in the Oxford Dictionary: "A
way of thinking which seeks solutions to intractable
problems through unorthodox methods or elements
which would normally be ignored by logical thinking."
In self organizing information systems, patterns are
formed. Our minds are trained to find typical and
predictable solutions to problems.
Lateral Thinking is a method for cutting across patterns.
It is for changing concepts and perceptions.
green Hat Support

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Junk Drawer
green Hat Support

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Green Hat – Random Word
green Hat Support

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Dr. Edward De Bono - Green Hat Creativity
green Hat Support

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Red Hat
Factory Floor Table Top and-on board
and-on board
red Hat Support

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red Hat Support
Thinking, Fast and Slow
Daniel Kahneman
System 1, is our fast, automatic, intuitive and largely
unconscious mode.
System 2, in Kahneman’s scheme, is our slow, deliberate,
analytical and consciously effortful mode of reasoning about the
world.
… discovered “systematic errors in the thinking of normal
people”: errors arising not from the corrupting effects of emotion,
but built into our evolved cognitive machinery.

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blue Hat Support

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the Hats concept; traditional link between thinking
and hats; hats can be put on and taken off easily
six hats, colors, types of thinking; each indicates a
role
separating acts of thinking
A/B argument, Greek tradition
parallel thinking; aligned, synergistic; ideas stored in
patterns; not group think
Six hats – considerations, recommendations

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creativity vs. 6 Hats
thinking ingredient
black hat ease
why 6
use alone, conversation, meeting, reports
observations - all hats are often represented at a
meeting, but at the same time
fundamental vs. gee whiz
Six hats – considerations, recommendations

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YES
NO
PO
Six hats – considerations, recommendations

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How and when to use the hats alone
Yellow
Red
Black
Green
White
Blue
Six hats – considerations, recommendations

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Next Steps:
1.Select a business goal that
needs attention.
2.Identify the behaviors,
decisions, and ideas that
you would prefer to see.
3.What thinking approach and style would produce the
preferred ideas, behaviors and decisions that would deliver
the business goal you seek?
4.Then find a resource to help you learn to think that way.
Implementation

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Question & Answer
thank you for attending

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•Extra Credit
56

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Stamp Out BOPSAT
Bunch of people sitting around talking.
7. ADDITIONAL IDEATION TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

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Stamp Out BOPSAT: A carousel of egos
• As Michael Schrage (MIT) describes it, “When someone talks, he is the focus
of discussion. People look at him. People react to what he says and how he
looks.
• The meeting is a carousel of egos, each grasping for the brass ring of
attention. The group does nothing.”
7. ADDITIONAL IDEATION TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

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• “Everything about the design of the meeting encourages
individuals to make their points, not the group to create a shared
understanding. . . .
7. ADDITIONAL IDEATION TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

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Data gathering and discussion process options
BOPSAT – Bunch of people sitting around talking
BOPSAT NON BOBSAT
7. ADDITIONAL IDEATION TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

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BOPSAT
NON BOPSAT

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BOPSAT
NON BOPSAT

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Resources
Web: www.johncanfield.com
Videos: www.YouTube.com/canfieldgoodthinking
Books: www.amazon.com
JOHN CANFIELD
+1.616.283.5588