The internationally bestselling guide to better thinking used by tens of thousands of people - fully revised and updated. There is nothing more sad and wasteful than a roomful of intelligent and highly paid people waiting for a chance to attack something the speaker has said. With the Six Hats methods the fullest use is made of everyone's intelligence, experience and information. The Six Hats also removes all "ego" from the discussion process. The need for the Six Hats is based on an understanding of how the brain chemicals change with the mode of thinking. Using this method one major corporation reduced the time taken for multinational project discussions from 30 days to just two days. Argument is inefficient, ineffective and slow. Argument was never designed to be constructive. The parallel thinking of the Six Hats method is rapidly replacing argument around the world. From senior executives at major corporations like Siemens, NTT, Prudential (US) to four-year-olds in school. From Khmer villagers in Cambodia to senior government departments. For 2,400 years we have been content with argument which was never designed to be constructive. Discovering "what is" may not be the same as designing "what can be".

Table of Contents

Introduction: six hats, six colours. The white hat: the white hat - facts and figures; white hat thinking -whose fact is it? white hat thinking - Japanese-style input; white hat thinking - facts, truth and philosophers; white hat thinking - who puts on the hat? summary of white hat thinking. The red hat: the red hat - emotions and feelings; red hat thanking - the place of emotions in thinking; red hat thinking - intuition and hunches; red hat thinking - moment to moment; red hat thinking the use of emotions; red hat thinking the language of emotions; summary of red hat thinking. The black hat: the black hat - cautions and careful; black hat thinking - content and process; black hat thinking - the past and the future; black hat thinking the problem of overuse; summary of black hat thinking. The yellow hat: the yellow hat - speculative-positive; yellow hat thinking - the positive spectrum; yellow hat thinking - reasons and logical support; yellow hat thinking - constructive thinking; yellow hat thinking speculation; yellow hat thinking relation to creativity; summary of yellow hat thinking. The green hat: the green hat - creative thinking; green hat thinking - lateral thinking; green hat thinking -movement instead of judgement; green hat thinking - the need for provocation; green hat thinking -alternatives; green hat thinking - personality and skill; green hat thinking - what happens to the ideas? summary of green hat thinking. The blue hat: the blue hat - control of thinking; blue hat thinking - focus; blue hat thinking - program design; blue hat thinking -summaries and conclusions; blue hat thinking - control and monitoring; summary of blue hat thinking; benefits of the six hats methods.