Critical Thinking for Leadership

Communication
Prof.SSRahul K Shukla
E: rahul.shukla@xlri.ac.in
 System 1 and System 2 Thinking

System 1 thinking refers to our intuitive system, which is

typically fast, automatic, effortless, implicit and emotional.
• For instance we usually decide how to interpret verbal
language or visual information automatically and
unconsciously.

• System 2 refers to reasoning that is slower, conscious,

effortful, explicit and logical.
 Let’s Move-on to Level 2

Sanjay is a very shy and withdrawn, invariably helpful but

with very little interest in people or in the world of reality.
A meek and tidy soul, he has a need for order and structure,
and a passion for detail.”

Is Sanjay more likely to be a librarian or a farmer and why?

 Think Through

• Most people believe Sanjay is more likely to be librarian

• Sanjay resembles a librarian more than a farmer.

Ø Associative memory quickly constructs this
picture.

• What elements do we neglect?

Ø There are only a few librarians in India, but there
are around 600 million farmers in India.
Ø Ratio of male farmers to male librarians is even
higher
 Why Does This Happen?

• Probably because of Judgmental Heuristics (decision-

making shortcuts); they overpower critical thinking.

• The Availability Heuristic

• The Representativeness Heuristic
• Positive Hypothesis Testing
• The Affect Heuristic
 Thus, Critical Thinking Is:

• Manual Thinking (Not Automatic)

• Purposeful

• Being Aware of Partiality of Your Thinking

• A Process

• Thinking That Uses a Tool Set

 Definition of Critical Thinking

• A collection of skills we use everyday that are necessary

for our full intellectual and personal development.

• It requires good analytical skills.

• Remember, logic is a part of critical thinking. Critical

thinking involves the application of the rules of logic as
well as gathering evidence, evaluating them and coming
up with an action plan.
 Why Is It Important for US ?

Cognitive Development of Human Beings:

Stage 1: Dualism

Stage 2: Relativism

Stage 3: Commitment
 Critical Thinking

Critical Thinking is thinking in a different way. The different way

implies being:

Ø Analytical
Ø Thoughtful
Ø Questioning
Ø Probing
Ø Organized
Ø Innovative
Ø Socratic
Ø Logical
Ø Methodological
Ø Not taking things for granted
Ø Out of the box
Ø Procedural
Ø Scientific
 Characteristics of a Good Critical Thinker

• Analytical
• Effective communicator
• Has research and enquiry skills
• Flexibility and tolerance for ambiguity
• Holds open-minder skepticism
• Creative Problem Solver
• Attentive, Mindful and Curious
 Critical Thinking and Self Development

• Living the Self-Examined Life

• Developing a Rational Life Plan
• Facing Challenges
• Importance of Self-Esteem
 Tanks at Tiananmen Square

1. What do you think in the student in the photo is thinking? What had led him to
take this action? Does his action show good critical thinking?

2. Imagine yourself in a similar situation. Discuss how you would most likely reach
and how your reaction is a reflection of your current self development? What steps
could you take in your life to make yourself more likely to engage in civil
disobedience, particularly in a case where your life was not at stake?
The Three Levels of Thinking
 The Three Levels of Thinking

• Experience
• I was turned down for the Job I was interviewed
• Raman held the door open for me when I was leaving the class

• Interpretation
• I didn’t get the job because I didn’t have the right connection
• Raman is a chauvinist pig who thinks women are too weak to open
their own doors

• Analysis
• Was it my back connection or my poor interviewing skills or lack
of job qualification that caused me not to get the job?
• What was Raman’s intention in holding the door open for me?
 Types of Resistance

• Avoidance

• Anger

• Clichés

• Denial

• Struggling

• Distractions
 Narrow-Mindedness

• Absolutism

• Fear to Challenge

• Egocentricity

• Ethnocentricity

• Anthropocentricity
 Frameworks and Tools of Critical Thinking

Critical thinking framework is a three-step process:

• Clarity: Get clear on the issue, problem, or goal; companies

call them head scratcher.

• Conclusions: Take your clear head scratcher through the

process of coming to a solution about what to do.

• Decisions: Take each one of your conclusions and decide

to do it or not do it; to act, or to not act; to go or not to go.
 How can we bring clarity?

• Empty your bucket

• Inspection
• Why?
• So what?
• What Else
• Ingredient diagram
 Empty Your Bucket
(There is always a way! )
Been there,
Done that!

Conflicting priorities,
Strategies &
Projects
Lack of Resources,
Time &
Budget
Other Departments
 Inspection

• We: What are we?

• Need: Is this the need?
• Improve: Improve to what?
• Quality: What’s the definition of quality?
• Our contribution
 Why why?

• To distinguish this from that;

• To find a root cause;
• To get to know I don’t know;
• To get to the double because (Because!!)
 So what?

• So what? It is the value you provide to your peers,

family and company. Try it in:
• Meetings
• When unexpected or unplanned happened
• After receiving the answer to why
• After looking at spreadsheet, reports & data
• Lessons learned
• New Initiatives and prioritization
• New Products and marketing strategies
 What Else?

• This is a tool to prevent coming to a premature

conclusion. Condition:
• When you think you know the reason for something?
• When you thought you knew the reason for something?
• During Brainstorming
• When building or designing something
• Augment what next with what else
• When you want to augment inspection
Check for…
 Accuracy

1. How could be check on what?

2. How could we find out if that is true?
3. How could we verify or test that?
 Precision

1. Could you be more specific?

2. Could you give me more details?
3. Could you be more exact?
 Relevance

• How does that relate to the problem?

• How does that bear on the question?
• How does that help us with the issue?
 Depth

• What factors make this a difficult problem?

• What are some of the complexities of this question?
• What are some of the difficulties we need to deal with?
 Logic

• Does all this make sense together?

• Does your first paragraph fit in with your last?
• Does what you say follow from the evidence?
 Assumptions

• Do they make sense?

• Do they fit reality as we have lived it?
• Under what conditions may they be true?
• Under what conditions may they be false?
• Recognize and assess arguments
• Question evidence
• Determine facts without bias or prejudice
• Decide to accept, reject or suspend judgments.
The Elements of Thought
 Intellectual Traits

• Intellectual Humility
• Intellectual Autonomy
• Intellectual Integrity
• Intellectual Courage
• Perseverance
• Confidence in Reason
• Intellectual Empathy
• Fairmindedness
 Take Away

• Think methodically
• Approach the chaos
• Get into ambiguity
• Distinguish between syntax and semantics
• Differentiate between signifier and the signified
• Sort, select, amplify, generate
• Look close, look away, look back
 Exercise Time

1. Why is the ad controversial?

2. Also, why was this ad considered uncontroversial by the
ad-makers?
3. To support your claims use the following: themes,
cultural issues, socio-political issues, and semiotics.
Thank you!
Analysis and Critical Thinking
What is Analysis
 Here is a Good News!

• You already use analysis skills every day.

• If you read restaurant reviews on Zomato before deciding
where to eat,
• or ponder who will become the captain of Team India after
Kohli retires
• You're critically considering different sources, competing
priorities and contrasting information in order to arrive at the
best possible understanding of the situation.
• You're breaking the issue down into parts and determining
which sources are the most reliable, which information is the
most relevant. That's analysis.
 Analysis Defined

• To analyze something is to ask what that something

means.
• It is to ask how something does what it does or why it is
as it is.
• Thus, Analysis is, then, a form of detective work that
typically pursues something puzzling, something you are
seeking to understand rather than something you believe
you already have the answer to.
If you are being followed by a dog, what will be your first
response—other than breaking in to a cold sweat?
 Analysis

• Level 1: What does being followed by a large dog mean for

me, here, now?
• Does it mean the dog is vicious and about to attack?
• Does it mean the dog is curious and wants to play?

• Level 2 (Divide into parts)

• You might notice that he’s dragging a leash, has a ball
in his mouth, and is wearing a bright red scarf around
his neck.
• You will analyze and decide nature of the dog: possibly
somebody’s lost pet, playful, probably not hostile,
unlikely to bite me.
Analysis is Construction and Deconstruction

• When you are analyzing:

• divide the subject into its defining parts, its main
elements or ingredients

• consider how these parts are related, both to each other

and to the subject as a whole.

Important: Pay close attention to the details.

 Analysis and Summary

• Summary differs from analysis, because the aim of

summary is to recount in reduced form someone else’s
ideas.
• The analysis provides perspective on the subject
• Summary is important to analysis, because you can’t
analyze a subject without laying out its significant parts
for your reader.
 Analysis and Argumentation

Analysis and argument proceed in the same way—they

offer evidence, make claims about it and supply reasons
that explain and justify the claims.
 Analysis Vs. Argument

• In analysis, the evidence (your data) is something you

wish to understand.
• The claim that an analysis makes is usually a tentative
answer to a what, how, or why question
 Analysis Vs. Argument

• The claim that an argument makes is often an answer to a

should question:
• For example, readers should or shouldn’t vote for bans
on smoking in public buildings or they should or
shouldn’t believe that gays can function effectively in the
military.
 Analysis Vs. Argument

The writer of an analysis is more concerned with

discovering how each of these complex subjects might be
defined and explained than with convincing readers to
approve or disapprove of them unlike argumentative
writing.
 Analysis versus Data Dumping

Definition of “analysis”:

• You put the premises together and make an inference

or draw a logical conclusion, which is your claim

• If the inference is missing, you are just “dumping

data” on the reader.
Premises«Inferences
 Inference?

• An inference is a meaning that is suggested rather than

directly stated.

• Inferences are implied through the clues that lead the

reader to draw conclusions.
 Inferences
• Recognizing the suggested meaning
• E.g.: A woman without her man is nothing.

• Connecting with the prior knowledge

• Recognizing the slanted language
• Identifying the clues that imply meaning
 Is stated the implied…?
• Because you are not attending my classes, you will get a big
surprise at the end.

• Though serial killers are bad, hunting is a good sport.

• Though jail is for punishment, zoos are the fun place to be at.

• Weather forecast for tonight: dark.

 Analysis

Premise:
data
Premise:
Premise: assumptions
reasons logical
propositions

Inferences
 Inferences and Assumptions

Situation/Premises

Assumptions
Conscious Level of Thinking

Inferences
 Inferences Versus Assumptions

• Inferences are conclusion based off of certain facts.

Solely based on these facts, different conclusions can be
drawn, depending on a personal point of view.

• Assumption is an essential step that connect the premise

to the conclusion. In many cases the conclusion cannot be
reached without this step.
Communication and Writing
 PACER Technique

P: Probe Identification
A: Argumentation
C: Criteria
E: Evaluation
R: Recommendation
 Counterproductive Habits

The Problem
 Habit 1

• The Judgment Reflex: In its most primitive form—most

automatic and least thoughtful—judging is like an on/off
switch.

• When people leap to judgment, they usually land in the

mental pathways they’ve grown accustomed to traveling,
guided by family or friends or popular opinion.
 Cures of Habit 1

• Become conscious of the like/dislike switch in your own

thinking and try to avoid it altogether

• Neither agree nor disagree with another person’s position until

you can repeat that position in a way the other person would
accept as fair and accurate.

• Try eliminating the word “should” from your vocabulary for a

while. Judgments often take the form of should statements.

• Try eliminating evaluative adjectives—those that offer

judgments with no data.
 Habit 2

• Neutralizing Our Assumptions: The word naturalize in

this context means we are representing—and seeing— our
own assumptions as natural, as simply the way things are
and ought to be.

• Focus on Context Assumptions

 Habit 3

• Generalizing: What it all boils down to is . . . What this

adds up to is . . . The gist of her speech was . . . We
generalize from our experience because this is one way of
arriving at ideas.

• The problem with generalizing as a habit of mind is that it

removes the mind—usually much too quickly—from the
data that produced the generalization in the first place.
 Cures of Habit 3

• Press yourself to trace your general impressions back to the

particulars that caused them.

• Train yourself to be more conscious of where your

generalizations come from.
 Rules

• Get Comfortable with uncertainty

• Be detective
• Ask open-ended questions
• Learn to Notice
• Interesting
• Revealing
• Strange
• Deconstruct & Construct
 Analysis

Suspend
Judgments

Keep
Define
Reformulating
Parts
Questions

Make
Look for
Implicit
Patterns
Explicit
 The Five Analytical Moves

• Move 1: Suspend judgment.

• Move 2: Define significant parts and how they are related.

• Move 3: Make the implicit explicit. Push observations to

implications by asking “so what?”

• Move 4: Look for patterns of repetition and contrast and

for anomalies (the method).

• Move 5: Keep reformulating questions and explanations.

 Make Implicit, Explicit

• What does the observation imply?

• Why does this observation matter?
• Where does this observation get us?
• How can we begin to theorize the significance of the
observation?
Look for Patterns of Repetition and Contrast
and for Anomalies
• What repeats?
• What goes with what? (strands)
• What is opposed to what? (binaries)
(for all of these) SO WHAT?
• What doesn’t fit? (anomalies) So what?
To recapitulate, Analysis is…
 References

Monippally, M.M. & Pawar, B.S.(2013). Academic writing.

New Delhi: Response Books, SAGE Publications Inc.
Osmond, Alex. (2013). Academic writing and grammar for
students. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publication
Ltd.
Thank you!