Agile Critical Thinking Webinar on Decision-Making

The Center for Agile Thinking  and iPleaders jointly organized a webinar on 'The Skills You Need to Make Better Decisions in a Complex, Competitive and Dynamic Workplace' conducted by Prof. Anne P. Kreitzberg, Co-founder and Principal at The Center for Agile Thinking. Here is a brief overview and a few stills from the well-received event...

Successful planning does not deal with future decisions, but with the future of present decisions.

- Peter Drucker

This quote sums up the importance of not just making the right decisions but also the timing of them.  A decision that might seem good in present conditions could have a different impact in the future. Hence, in order to succeed in tough, challenging situations it simply isn't enough to make good decisions but to make good decisions with one eye firmly set on the ultimate goal or objective. Now, this might seem like an impossible task but, like many other talents, the ability to make good decisions can be mastered by learning (and putting to practice) certain skills. These skills are even more important to learn, and perfect, given how complex and dynamic current workplaces are.

Of course, you'll find a lot of resources that'll direct you to a pile of information that promise to help you make better decisions but very few will guide you through a process and clearly define what YOU need to do in critical situations. Now, imagine being provided the necessary knowledge and being guided by a distinguished author, speaker, facilitator and coach working with leaders to build effective strategies, organizations and teams and with over 30 years of experience working with corporates, educational institutions and the government? You're bound to come off wiser from the experience, right? That was exactly what this Webinar was all about. Prof. Anne Kreitzberg  (see bio below) and her husband Charlie Kreitzberg have worked effortlessly for the past 2-3 decades trying to come up with effective strategies to help businesses improve thinking and decision-making within their organizations. This webinar was a great insight into the strategies that you can use to improve your individual decision-making capabilities, irrespective of your professional position, and apply the techniques to influence those around you.

The overall theme of the webinar revolved around one main question: 

Why do we see so many decisions (business or otherwise) that seem devoid of logic or reason? 

What Prof. Kreitzberg pointed out was that "though there are many reasons, one of the most important was because organizations are made up of people – some of whom behave rationally most of the time – but by and large, there also many who make decisions irrationally. And there are lots of people who are either a decision maker, influence a decision – or may just be impacted by the decision. Managers, clients, coworkers, vendors, alliance partners – there’s lots of room for irrational influences." Another reason is that decisions are not based on logic alone, decisions are also influenced by the environment around us! In today's dynamic world, "big challenges brought about by the economy, technology, business conditions, globalization – and we are all dealing with constant change - which requires agility and that’s hard to apply in organizations." 

And below is the summary of what you must be able to do, given the above mentioned factors, to make reasonable decisions.

Of course, cause is of no help without an effective remedy and hence it is important to possess the necessary tools which are practical and flexible to be able to tackle complex problems and situations, deal with all of the challenges that make critical thinking so difficult to do when you work in an organization and eventually lead you to be able to make good, personal and professional, decisions.

And the framework and technique that addresses this requirement is best explained in the words of Prof. Kreitzberg herself:

'This led us to create The Agile Critical Thinking , which we use to provide a framework and techniques that can be used to apply critical thinking to work situations.

There are three steps: Assess the Situation, Consider the Evidence and Take Action – and it’s no accident that they spell the word ACT. Because in the business world, the purpose of critical thinking is to make decisions or recommendations that lead to ACTION. And hopefully those actions leads to good outcomes.

One thing we know about the business world, or life in general, is that situations change, we learn more or see the situation differently as time goes on. So there’s a need for Agility – not ‘flip flopping’; but re-assessing how we see a situation, interpret information or the conclusions they have lead us to, or even the actions we take.' Below is a diagram showing the ACT model.

Here are some more screenshots from the webinar:

Update: We now have a recorded version of the webinar on our website. Click here to view.

To learn more about any of the tools or techniques to improve your critical thinking, to ask any questions or to view a recording of the webinar please get in touch by email with Prof. Anne Kreitzberg (anne@agilethinking.com) Or Venkat Iyer (venkat@agilethinking.com). 

For more information on future webinars, programs, products and services please visit www.agilethinking.com