Your Career: Some Thoughts About a Critical Thinker

By Chip Law

Recently a client sent me an email expressing concern over a news show he recently viewed on national television. The show emphasized the fact that the US is using robots or machines to handle many of the required tasks in a job. In the show a hospital worker was talking about a task being done in the hospital. Her quote, “the robots can't do it because it requires critical thinking”. The client seeks to hire for key positions in his company and felt that getting critical thinkers into the organization was imperative. The client asked: How can I find them?

Some Background

Today businesses, institutions and organizations have a huge deficit in human capital i.e., the small number of their employees that have mastered the ability to think critically. Here are some reasons why:

·         We reward left brain thinking. This is a linear thought pattern and requires straight forward (proven) methodologies for analysis, planning and execution.

·         Our current systems reward those that meet our expectations and give answers that we think are right because we happen to think like them ourselves. If you go against the grain or presupposed thinking, you risk being fired or ruining your career.

·         We confuse strategy with strategic thinking or problem solving.

·         We solve problems one at a time, thinking we’ve done the whole job and a good one at that: think of the medical field where one takes care of the symptom but ignores the root cause.

·         Failure is not accepted, experimentation is not tolerated

·         Our entire educational system is predicated upon measures of success that are almost fully left brain oriented: think GPA and standardized tests. Someone with a good ability for rote memorization can ace these tests and have a high GPA but retain next to nothing.

·         None of the above requires a person to think more deeply about the world they live in, yet by conventional norms they are highly successful. Right?

·         Perhaps one has given deep or unconventional thought to provide a solution to some particular issue and been able to articulate it well, only to have the left brain world tell them that are not coloring within the lines i.e., their opinion is not respected or wanted.

I could go on and on but I think one can easily get the idea. We reward this person, we expect this person to have certain behaviors and when they do, we think they will be the right person for a college, or a job etc.

Tips to discern critical thinkers in the hiring process

So for business situations, how do you identify people that have good critical thinking skills? Here are some thoughts:

·         They would likely have a liberal arts degree with a healthy dose of philosophy and then an MBA with an international global business focus. By the way, at the undergrad level, Jesuit schools produce students with excellent critical thinking skills

·         They’ve conducted and published original research. (Research here meaning an in-depth critical look at a particular area of interest or study).

·         They have demonstrated a passion for something that allows them to go very deeply into the subject area.

·         They can remove themselves from this depth and take a view of the same subject from a mile high. From there they question everything, look at “what if” scenarios and probabilities and then offer solutions, options and contingencies.

·         On their resume they should have the PAR (Problem, Action, Resolution) format which can really help one interview them in a manner that will naturally surface some critical thinking discussion.

·         Present them with real scenarios (both in your business and outside it). When they respond, look at how their thought process addresses the situation.

o    Were they thorough? Imaginative? Unconventional? 

o    Did they ask (the right) questions?

o    Did they clearly explain how they arrived at their conclusion?

o    Did they mention that they had areas where they were not expert but knew what was required and how to get it?

o    Did they offer solutions? If so, were they only immediate or did they think of long term implications? (a changing economy and workforce, social and demographic trends, advanced technologies, etc.)

o    Can they give you a quick SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) synopsis?

                  o    Could they make intelligent connections to areas that might be 

                        considered obscure to others?

When reflecting on the candidate, a good critical thinker should have stimulated your own thinking patterns, made you feel energized and created an urgency for you to take action. These are the special people that can actually teach you a thing or two just by observing how differently and openly they tackle what is put upon their plate.

Stimulate your thinking

For some great insight into this phenomenon I suggest picking up a copy of Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind…In it, he basically says that to survive in the future, we will need to train and reward right brain thinkers. We’ll still need the left brain excellence, but that is taken as a given.

Thomas P. “Chip” Law is an IECA Professional Member and an Educational Consultant. He helps students and adults define their career path and refine their approach to the job market. He can be reached at 843-278-1271 or chip@eduave.com

College Admissions: It’s All About ADD

By Chip Law

It’s February and time for the annual pandemic of ADD!

Aha, if you are thinking this story is either wacko or just another rant about Attention Deficit Disorder you are incorrect. This seasonal event starts in late December and can last until April and in some cases even into the summer. This ADD has to do with college admissions and only students truly immune from this syndrome are those that have had the joy of receiving an offer of admission from the college to which they applied via the Early Decision process.

The ADD in this case is Admitted, Deferred or Denied.  For the rest of those susceptible to ADD, the symptoms run the gamut: euphoria, confusion, indecision, depression, inertia, anxiety and many others. These terms are often taken as defining a student. Their young life’s “body of work” has gone into getting into that special college or university that just calls their name. Even though the word admitted sounds like a terrific outcome, it can present problems albeit different than the noncommittal deferred or the funereal tone of a denial. Let’s look at the components of ADD, see what they might mean and how you, the student, can make the best of their impact.

Admitted

Okay, let’s say several colleges have said they see you as a match for their college and they have made you an offer of admission. Wow, now you’ve got choices! How you approach the choices can make the A in ADD a positive or not. The more intimately you get to know the colleges that accepted you, the easier it will be to make a decision. You will need to revisit the campus and use that opportunity to grill students and faculty with questions that you feel you MUST have answered in order to make an informed decision. Stay overnight, use online forums and social media to get the pulse of the college and see if it really meets your expectations both from a social and academic interest point of view.

Problem solved right? Not so fast my friend. Most families are bracing for the hard economic realities of today and college funding is an important, if not the most important, factor in making a college selection. This is the time to look VERY carefully at the TOTAL cost of attendance at each college that’s offered you a place in their incoming class. Along with your parents and perhaps an external advisor, you need to understand the world of loans, work/study, and budgeting time and money. Once you understand the REAL cost of attendance, then you will be in a position to make a decision on which college will be the total best fit for you AND your parents.

Denied

This is rough. It is agonizing. It is a traumatic event. It can crush you and take away your motivation…the list of negative things could go on and on. A denial is nothing more than what it implies: the college did not see you as a fit and it let you know so that you could move on to consider other possibilities. It is how YOU take the denial that is most important. It is okay to cry, to grieve, to be angry, to think about telling the college how sorry they are going to be for not taking you and so on… You are now at a pivotal point in your development of coping skills that will be a part of the formation of the future person you will become. Go through the Kubler-Ross psychological steps of the loss: the first being-guess what? : Denial, then Anger (no problem there right?), Bargaining (I’ll do ANYTHING to change this outcome), Depression (it's okay to feel bad, you’re human) and then most importantly Acceptance.

Acceptance (amazing how these college admission words keep coming up!) of the result allows you to move on. Moving through the stages quickly will get you focused in the right direction instead of playing the "If only I": woulda, coulda, shoulda blame games. You can now look at your other choices and if you really look carefully you’ll find some wonderful things in the college that DOES want you on their campus.

Deferred

This is the beast of ADD because it leaves you in limbo. This is your absolute first choice in colleges. You compare yourself to others that were admitted and don’t see how they could have been chosen over you. You do the math based on what is the probability of getting in as an admitted student if you were originally deferred. You feel panicky because you do not have the path cleared for you like the admitted or denied student. Well, DON’T let paralysis creep into the picture. You must put a plan in place that deals with the possible outcomes and you must do it right away.

First, let the college know that you still have a strong desire to attend. You have established some level of email communication with the admissions officer that is responsible for your geography, right? Let them know how you feel. If you get ANY good news, academic or otherwise, that might shed new light or reinforce a positive bit of information about yourself, make sure that the college is informed. To do this you can use your email contact or if appropriate, your college counselor, but don’t be a pest and email every day. Once you have done these things you must move on to make other plans. Be prepared to go through the same grief steps of those that were denied and then generate and direct your enthusiasm on to your next college. Lighten up and make the best of a (not so really) bad situation. Doing nothing is NOT an option and fretting will only take a toll on your mental and physical health. You must put yourself into a position where you can envision a positive outcome NO MATTER what happens.

For behavioral ADD, people are now asked to use the acronym ADHD instead of ADD. So for this rendition of ADD let’s add the “H”. In this case, H stands for HOPE. Not hope like winning a lottery, but hope in terms of optimism, future promise, and the filling of expectations. While the content of your ADD may be immutable, the way you hold and interpret and act on the context will define how you can handle this form of ADD.

Thomas P. “Chip” Law is an IECA Professional Member and an Educational Consultant. He helps students and parents find the best college match for them.  He can be reached at 843-278-1271 or chip@eduave.com

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