Quality Improvement Essentials
One of the central points of critically evaluating assumptions includes examining an issue from multiple viewpoints. In your work environment you will typically interact with individuals who will have a different cultural background, assumption set, and biases than your own. Frequently, you will have to overcome these hurdles to establish a working relationship for a given project.
Collison et al provide some insight into the function of critical thinking from the perspective of an instructor facilitating critical thinking among students. This reading identifies strategies to help sharpen the focus of a dialogue and to help participants deepen discussion of any given topic. While the focus of the paper is online threaded discussion, the principles can be applied to any mode of interaction – face-to-face, telephone, written/electronic; and to any type of interaction – instructor-student, professional-client, peer-to-peer, etc.
The ability to focus a discussion and to unpack key topic areas, perspectives, assumptions, and biases held by participants is critical to reach a consensus decision and drive any project forward. Click on the icon below to access:
From Critical Thinking Strategies from Facilitating Online Learning: Effective Strategies for Moderators by George Collison, Bonnie Elbaum, Sarah Haavind, and Robert Tinker (Atwood Publishing: Madison, WI, 2000).