Question

[Critical thinking]

Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In this regard, answer the following questions

1. What exactly is critical thinking?

2. What are the 5 critical thinking skills?

3. How to improve critical thinking?

4. briefly describe a situation where you applied critical thinking?

Answer 1

(1) Critical thinking refers to the act of making decision on the basis of facts and figures and analysing the facts and thus forming the judgement and take decision accordingly. It refers to the ability to think critically and rationally before taking any kind of decision and not simply relying on the ideas and gut feelings.

(2) The five types of critical thinking skills are as follows:

• Interpretation: it refers to the art of interpreting the facts and understanding the figures given and then taking decision on the basis of the understanding.
• Analysis: it refers to the ability of studying or examining the elements and facts in a detailed manner so that taking decision becomes easy and logical.
• Inference: it means the ability to reach to any conclusion on the basis of strong evidence and reasoning.
• Explanation: this means being able to explain the decision with the help of the facts and the figures and ensuring that every employee understands the decision taken.
• Self regulation: it is the ability to manage and handle your own emotions, thoughts and behaviours in a kind which helps to manage the results accordingly.

(3) There are various ways by which critical thinking can be improved:

• Start relying on more facts and figures while taking any decision and not just relying on the gut feeling and thoughts.
• One must try to research deeply into the matter and look into all the available facts before deciding the action to be taken.
• One must learn to evaluate and understand every fact, figure and thereafter on the basis of evaluation take the action.
• One should never be over confident and assume that whatever the person is doing is right and there are no chance of improvement.

(4) One of the situation where critical thinking can be applied is before taking a decision as to whether accept the project and invest in the particular project or not, by the company where I was the project manager. Here thinking critically involved seeing the facts and figures available and analysing the pros and cons associated with all the projects. Moreover, the net present value, the profitability index also helped and served as a base for taking any decision critically and not just illogically.