Six Thinking Hats method can be useful when taking a discussion/workshop with several participants and at the same time you want to make sure that you will get some concrete results out of the session. This method nicely gives a structured approach on how to run the session, instead of letting participants to go from one extreme into another.
To get a quick introduction, I highly recommend to see one of the following videos:
- Six Thinking Hats (6 min video)
- Creativity: 6 Thinking Hats (4 min video)
- What Is Six Thinking Hats? (2 min video)
The picture below is from the first video.
A concrete example is available here, and a powerpoint template is here.
How the session could look like, in which order to use the hats etc, then one could have a look here. With some examples:
First ideas:
- blue – definition of subject
- white – ready knowledge
- green – generating ideas
Problem Solving:
- blue – definition of problem
- white – available info
- green – possible solutions
- yellow – reality check solutions
- black – weak points solutions
- white – connect to info
- blue – draw conclusion
Decision Making:
- blue – topic of decision
- green – offer alternatives
- white – factual situation
- yellow – suitability alternatives
- black – un-suitability alternatives
- red – making the decision
- black – assessing decision