Tip: Critical thinking skills can be really valuable for many walks of life. It’s about approaching new information with a mix of humble curiosity and doubt.
Think independently and ask good questions that help make thoughtful decisions.
In broad strokes, some of the questions I like to ask based on critical thinking are:
➡️ How do we know we're solving the right problem? ➡️ How do we know we're solving the problem in the right way? (i.e. balancing rigor and efficiency, given our understanding of the problem and constraints) ➡️ If we don't know the sources of our problem, how can we determine the root cause? ➡️ How can we break the key question down into smaller questions that we can analyze further? ➡️ Once we have one or more hypotheses, how do we structure work to evaluate them? ➡️ What shortcuts might we take if we're under constraints (time pressure) without unduly compromising our analytics rigor around the question? ➡️ Does the evidence sufficiently support the conclusions? How do we know when we are done? When is the solution "good enough"? ➡️ How do I communicate the solution clearly and logically to all stakeholders?
I've found these questions often help. Sometimes we'll address the symptom of a problem, only to discover there are other symptoms that pop up. At other times, we might quickly ship a solution that creates more problems later down the road.
