develop team critical thinking skills
ยซ Business Leadership

5 Ways to Help Your Team Develop Critical Thinking Skills

Karin Hurt and David Dye talk about how to teach and motivate your team to think on their feet. Use these five tips to help your team develop critical thinking skills on their own.

5 mins readJuly 08, 2021

Author's Bio

Karin Hurt and David Dye help human-centered leaders resolve workplace ambiguity and chaos, so that they can drive innovation, productivity and revenue without burning out employees. As CEO and President of Letโ€™s Grow Leaders, Karin and David are the award-winning authors of five books.

โ€œIf you don't let your team see behind the curtain, you aren't building the next generation of leaders."

No one is born with perfect critical thinking skills. And, in our extensive research on innovation and problem solving we found 45% of employees said theyโ€™ve never been training in critical thinking and problem solving.

No matter how hardworking and loyal your team may be, lack of critical thinking skills will keep team members from reaching their full potential. Not to mention that building teams of critical thinkers and problem solvers will give you a distinct competitive advantage.

How to Help Your Team Develop Critical Thinking Skills

Here are five crucial tactics to use if you want to see more critical thinking from your team.

1. Ensure Your Team Understands What Success Looks Like

When managers come to us and say โ€œmy team lacks critical thinking skillsโ€ or โ€œmy team is just not that strategic, the biggest issue is often that they just donโ€™t have enough information to be strategic.

Be sure that your team can answer these strategic questions.

  1. Why do we do what we do?
  2. How does our teamโ€™s work contribute to the companyโ€™s mission?
  3. What do our customers really want?
  4. Who are our major competitors and what differentiates us in the market?
  5. How does the way we do our work impact other departments?
  6. How can we better articulate what we need to the departments we rely on?
  7. Whatโ€™s the most important thing weโ€™re working on and why?

2. Answer "Why" Early and Often

When you give your team instructions, you naturally expect immediate action. In the moment, it can feel like an obstruction for an employee to ask, "Why?" In the grand scheme of things, however, you want employees who ask questions.

Explaining the why gives your employees the context they need to make decisions on the same high level every time.

3. Let Your Team in On the Messy Decision-Making Process

As leaders, it's only natural to want to show up to every meeting totally prepared. We often feel like we have to have every detail worked out before we present a new plan. After all, you don't want to waste your team's finite time with endless meetings.

If you want to encourage critical thinking, however, expose your team to the messy process of decision-making (see also our Managers Guide to Better Decision Making)

Even if you have the final say, make your team feel included. Treat every suggestion with respect, whether it is a great idea or not. I

If you don't let your team see behind the curtain, you aren't building the next generation of leaders. And when you do adopt a team member's idea, be sure to give them credit (note 56% of the respondents in our research said the reason they donโ€™t share ideas is for fear that they wonโ€™t get the credit.).

4. Take Advantage of the "Plus One" Staff Meeting

Periodically, ask each direct report to invite one of their high-potential employees to the next staff meeting.

Naturally, a "plus one" meeting shouldn't feature any super-sensitive topics.

However, there's a lot of value in exposing your more inexperienced employees to a higher level of planning and decision-making. Your employees can gain totally new perspectives by sitting in on meetings they wouldn't typically attend. Mixing things up helps you identify and nurture new leaders who will keep your organization strong for years to come.

5. Help them to Vet Their I.D.E.A.s

Another way to help your team think more critically is to help them vet their ideas. Encourage them to ask four strategic questions about their ideas as they share them.

I- Why is this idea interesting (meaning how is it strategically aligned with where you most need a great idea)

D- Is this idea doable (have them explain why their idea could actually be done)

E- Engaging (help them consider key stakeholders they could include in the planning)

A- Actions (what are their recommended next steps. Bonus points if they offer to do them.

These 5 ways are a great way to help your team to develop their critical thinking skills. When you consistently work with your team over time to develop the confidence and competence to think more critically, youโ€™ll be amazed at the quantity and quality of ideas. And youโ€™ll have more time to focus on the work that you are best suited to do.

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