Six Thinking Hats
The Six Thinking Hats is a technique developed by Edward de Bono that helps individuals and groups think about a problem or situation from multiple perspectives. The technique involves assigning different "hats" to each group member or individual, representing a different way of thinking. The hats are:
- White hat: Facts and information
- Red hat: Emotions and feelings
- Black hat: Critical thinking and skepticism
- Yellow hat: Optimism and positivity
- Green hat: Creativity and innovation
- Blue hat: Control and organization[1]
During a brainstorming session, each participant puts on an imaginary hat and approaches the problem or idea from that perspective. Once all the ideas have been generated, the group can use the hats to evaluate and rank the ideas based on their feasibility, desirability, and viability. For example, let's say a service design team is working on improving the customer experience of a restaurant.
During a brainstorming session using the Six Thinking Hats technique, the team can generate a list of ideas such as:
- Offering a loyalty program to frequent customers (yellow hat)
- Reducing the wait time for customers to be seated (green hat)
- Offering a special menu for customers with dietary restrictions (white hat)
- Providing live music or entertainment (red hat)
- Increasing the number of staff to improve service (black hat)
- Offering a delivery service (blue hat)
After generating these ideas, the team may decide that offering a loyalty program and reducing the wait time for customers are both feasible and desirable, but offering live music is less feasible as it would require additional resources. Based on this evaluation, they may prioritize the loyalty program and wait time reduction ideas and begin to develop these further.
