Creative thinking: thinking outside the box approaches to creative and critical thinking

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Creative thinking thinking outside the box
approaches to creative and critical thinking

• James August, CQA
• American Biltrite, Inc.
• South Jersey ASQ
  March 16, 2005
• Princeton ASQ
  November 9, 2005
• Merrimack Valley ASQ
  March 1, 2007

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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart Igetting
them to understand

• need for people to change
• adult learning theory
• coaching and counseling
• application example

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Malcolm Knowles
Four principles for learning in adults

• Adults need to be involved in the planning and
  evaluation of their instruction.
• Experience (including mistakes) must provide the
  basis for training activities.
• Adults are more interested in learning subjects
  that have immediate relevance.
• Adult learning is problem-centered rather than
  content-oriented.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Coaching and counseling approaches address
  knowledge, understanding and application
• We need more sophisticated tools to address
  analysis, synthesis and evaluation

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Creative and Critical Thinking
Blooms Taxonomy

• Benjamin Bloom created a taxonomy for
  categorizing the levels of abstraction of
  questions.
• (taxonomy an orderly classification
  according to presumed relationships)

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Creative and Critical Thinking
Blooms Taxonomy
Levels of Competence Knowledge Comprehens
ion Application Analysis Synthesis Eva
luation
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Getting them to understand ...

• Coaching and counseling takes the learner through
  Knowledge, Comprehension and Application, the
  first three levels of Blooms Taxonomy for
  competence.
• Higher level creative and critical thinking is
  needed to gain Analysis, Synthesis and Evaluation
  skills.

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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart IIgetting
people to think

• define thinking
• logical argument
• deBonos six thinking hats
• TRIZ
• reductio ad absurdum
• application example

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Why do we need to
• understand techniques
• for Creative and
• Critical Thinking?
• Where can we apply techniques for Creative and
  Critical Thinking?

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Creative and Critical Thinking
Competency Measurement
Needs Assessment
Knowledge Management
Education (Theories Understanding)
Skill Training (Techniques)
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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Where is the bridge between the expectations for
  performance (theory) and the tools and techniques
  (skill sets)?
• Where is the training on how to think? Where is
  the training on how to teach people to think?

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Creative and Critical Thinking
What are the tools for traditional Creative and
Critical Thinking?Where are the applications for
Creative and Critical Thinking? Is Critical
Thinking the same as creative thinking?
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Creative and Critical Thinking
Creative thinking explores up alternative paths
to determine potential bases of an argument.
Critical thinking often follows detail down a
path to determine the basis of an argument.
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Creative and Critical Thinking

• creative thinking
• opens possibilities
• critical thinking
• narrows possibilities

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• What is creative thinking?

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Creative thinking allows us to see situations in
  a new light.
• Creative thinking may allow us to find solutions
  to problems that are different from past
  experience.
• We can apply creative thinking techniques in our
  interactions with our internal and external
  suppliers and customers.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Dont we do that all the time anyway?
• Well, no, actually most people see situations
  in the light of their own past experiences.
  Critical and creative thinking methods are tools
  to get past these innate hurdles.

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Creative and Critical Thinking
applications for creative and critical
thinking problem solving continuous improvement
efforts job training (any time decisions
are made)
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Creative and Critical Thinking
creative thinking Solutions must embody new
ideas or we can never really improve, so some
thinking must be creative as well as critical.
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Creative and Critical ThinkingBreakthrough

• to create deliberate change with a decisive
  movement to a new and unprecedented level of
  performance in customer satisfaction and
  financial performance. Juran

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Creative and Critical ThinkingStretch Goal

• A goal set so high that it cannot be achieved by
  incremental improvement it can only be achieved
  by a breakthrough approach.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• The 8020 Rule for problems (revisited)
• 80 of the time, a good solution can be found
  based on past experience.
• 20 of the time, past experience has provided
  bandaids. New ideas are required to develop a
  valid, permanent solution.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• The 8020 Rule for problems (revisited)
• The 20 that require new solutions represent 80
  of the opportunities for real performance
  improvement.

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Creative and Critical Thinking
tools for traditional critical thinking 5 Whys
(Peeling the Onion) Root Cause Analyses process
flow mapping PDCA, DMAIC, etc.
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Creative and Critical Thinking
tools for traditional creative thinking mind
mapping brainstorming FMEA lotus blossom theory
of constraints
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Creative and Critical Thinking
more tools for creative thinking logical
argument deBonos six thinking hats TRIZ
reductio ad absurdum
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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart IIgetting
people to think

• logical argument
• deBonos six thinking hats
• TRIZ
• reductio ad absurdum

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Creative and Critical Thinking as philosophy
  logic and arguments
• In "informal logic" or Creative and Critical
  Thinking, the focus is on the application of
  logical concepts to the analysis of everyday
  reasoning and problem-solving.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Arguments
• premises, inferences, and conclusion
• "My car will not start, therefore there is
  something wrong with the engine."

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Arguments are valid when they have the formal
  structure
• IF the premises are all true,
• THEN the conclusion Must be true.
• to be sound, the argument must be valid and the
  premises must be true

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• phases of Creative and Critical Thinking about
  arguments
• RECONSTRUCTION
• ASSESSMENT
• EVALUATION
• FALLACY IDENTIFICATION

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• phases of Creative and Critical Thinking
• RECONSTRUCTION- deals with extracting an argument
  from the surrounding mix of statements which may
  have been presented.
• ASSESSMENT- deals with the business of
  determining whether the structure of an argument
  really would permit truth to be carried from the
  premises to the conclusion.

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• phases of Creative and Critical Thinking
• EVALUATION- deals with the activity of judging
  whether the premises of an argument are true or
  false, clear or vague, and in need of further
  defense or not.
• FALLACY IDENTIFICATION- deals with the
  multifarious list of things that may happen in a
  persuasion context, leading to accepting some
  statement without adequate justification.

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Creative and Critical Thinking
"My car will not start, therefore there is
something wrong with the engine."

• EVALUATION The premises are insufficient
  for the conclusion drawn. What about being out
  of gas?

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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart IIgetting
people to think

• logical argument
• deBonos six thinking hats
• TRIZ
• reductio ad absurdum

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Edward de Bono
• a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, holds an M.A. in
  psychology and physiology from Oxford, a D. Phil.
  in Medicine and also a Ph.D. from Cambridge. Dr.
  de Bono's background in self-organising systems
  led him to derive an understanding which he then
  applied to the neural networks of the brain.
• Six thinking hats

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Creative and Critical Thinking

• deBonos Six Thinking Hats

White Hat The White Hat calls for information
known or needed.
Red Hat The Red Hat signifies feelings,
hunches, and intuition.
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Creative and Critical Thinking
Yellow Hat The Yellow Hat symbolizes values and
benefits and why something may work.
Black Hat The Black Hat is judgment - the
devil's advocate or why something may not work.
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Creative and Critical Thinking
 Green Hat The Green Hat focuses on
creativity possibilities, alternatives, and new
ideas.   Blue Hat The Blue
Hat is used to organize information and
manage the thinking
process. 
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Creative and Critical Thinking

• Information gather data (white)
• Intuition gut reaction (red)
• Creativity step back and get out-of-the-box
  (green)
• Analysis create knowledge and understanding
  (yellow)
• Judgment make an informed decision (black)
• Organize apply the business decision (blue)

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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart IIgetting
people to think

• logical argument
• deBonos six thinking hats
• TRIZ
• reductio ad absurdum

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Creative and Critical Thinking TRIZ (Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving)
TRIZ is the Russian acronym for Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving. Development of this
methodology was started in 1946 by Genrikh
Altshuller (1926-1998). It is a problem-solving
methodology based on a systematic logic approach
that was developed from reviewing thousands of
patents and an analysis of technology evolution.
TRIZ can be used as a powerful intellectual
instrument to solve simple and difficult
technical and technological problems more quickly
and with better results.
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Creative and Critical Thinking TRIZ (Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving)

• Levels of invention
• Level 1. A simple improvement of a technical
  system.
• Level 2. An invention that includes the
  resolution of a technical contradiction.
• Level 3. An invention containing a resolution of
  a physical contradiction.
• Level 4. A new technology is developed containing
  a breakthrough solution that requires knowledge
  from different fields of science.
• Level 5. Discovery of new phenomena and
  substances.

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Creative and Critical Thinking TRIZ (Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving)

• Analysis of the Problem
• Analysis of the Problem Model
• Ideal Final Result and Physical Contradiction
  Determination
• Mobilization and Utilization of Resources
• Utilization of the Information Database
• Change or Reformulate the Problem
• Analysis of the Method that removed the Physical
  Contradiction
• Utilization of obtained solutions
• Analysis of steps that lead to the solutions
• Ref 40 Principles. Extended Edition. By
  Genrikh Altshuller.
• Technical Innovation Center,
  Worcester, MA, 2005

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Creative and Critical Thinking TRIZ (Theory of
Inventive Problem Solving)
For problem solving, contradiction formulation
has the format Given element of the system
should have characteristic A in order to
realize required function (to solve problem) AND
this element should have characteristic non-A
in order to satisfy existent limitations and
requirements. For example The element should
be hot and cold or The element should be hard
and soft...
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Creative and Critical ThinkingPart IIgetting
people to think

• logical argument
• deBonos six thinking hats
• TRIZ
• reductio ad absurdum

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Creative and Critical Thinkingreductio ad
absurdum

• a mode of argumentation that seeks to
  establish a contention by deriving an absurdity
  from its denial, thus arguing that a thesis must
  be accepted because its rejection would be
  untenable.

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Creative and Critical Thinkingreductio ad
absurdum

• If that's so, then I'm a monkey's uncle.
• If that is true, then pigs can fly.
• If he did that, then I'm the Shah of Persia.

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Creative and Critical Thinkingreductio ad
absurdum

• Encourage people to share ideas that may, at
  first, sound outrageous.
• Then ask How can we make this outrageous idea
  into a workable solution?
• Wildest Idea Brainstorming
• N R Tague, Quality Toolbox, 2nd Ed, ASQ Quality
  Press , 2005

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Creative and Critical Thinkingreductio ad
absurdum

• Application Example
• How do I design a shock absorber system that
  can respond to many different kinds of road
  conditions?

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Creative and Critical Thinkingreductio ad
absurdum

• The outrageous idea How would I design a shock
  absorber system that can respond to many
  different wheel configurations (what if wheels
  were polygonal instead of round)?
• Solution Computerized sensor-controlled
  variable damping shock absorbers.

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Creative and Critical Thinkingteam exercise (20
min.)

• break into teams
• assign roles
• leader, recorder, timer, reader,
  facilitator, ...
• respond to the exercise question
• rotate responses (pass the envelope)
• evaluate/ productionize responses

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Creative and Critical Thinkingteam exercise (20
min.)

• Our Teddi Bare sales and distribution business
  is running at 62 of capacity and the overhead we
  carry has absorbed all profitability. How can we
  regain our profitability?
• (Remember, your suggested solution should be
  based on an absurd idea!)

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Creative and Critical Thinking can provide
synergistic approaches to improve relationships
with suppliers and (internal and external)
customers leading to win/win outcomes at Moments
of Truth in Cycles of Service
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Creative and Critical Thinking
Use creative and critical thinking tools to help
yourself and others move competence past
knowledge, understanding and application up
Blooms taxonomy to analysis, synthesis and
evaluation levels.
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Thank you

• Questions (that I can answer) ?