Six Hat Thinking

Six Hat Thinking - a tool for participation in development

By Dr Simon Batchelor,
Dr Simon Batchelor is currently a director of Gamos Ltd and freelance consultant. He was formerly programme leader and then country director for Christian Outreach, Cambodia. He authored the ABCD programme and implemented the first years, introducing and adapting the six hat thinking model.

Abstract

This paper documents the experience of an Non Governmental Organisation Christian Outreach, working in Cambodia on a programme of community development. The programme is focused on awareness change, and works with a number of participatory techniques to animate change.

The paper draws attention to some of the difficulties of a truly open ended conversation. It picks up on a simple model for describing thinking, called the "six thinking hat model", created by Edward De Bono. This model has been widely used in both adult and child education in the USA and Europe, and in management workshops for multinational companies. The paper describes the adoption of the model for community development in Cambodia. It describes the basic model, its use for staff capacity building, and its use in rural village communities as a framework for open ended conversations. It concludes that the model is a useful tool for ensuring comprehensive analysis of problems, creating a framework for conversations and preventing conflicts.

Introduction

As development becomes more participant led, we are finding a number of helpful tools that facilitate people's change in awareness. These have included participatory techniques such as mapping, timelines, drawings, problem codes, theatre and open ended discussions.

The practical details of the latter, the open ended discussion, often make it hard for the field worker to implement. Open questions can go nowhere. Open ended discussion can be frustrating as they do not seem to reveal the heart of the problem, or lead to any realistic analysis. When the objective of the discussion is an appraisal, then the semi structured interview helps. This interview at least has some defined goals. But when awareness change is required, and the agenda is to be totally set by the participants, the discussion needs to be even freer ranging. The animator or change agent needs to create space for the participants to discuss whatever they want. They need to discuss their felt needs and their "generative themes", and yet at the same time undertake analysis of those themes and find creative solutions.

How then, do we create a framework for the conversation without introducing the bias of our preconceived ideas?

This was the challenge set by the programme ABCD implemented by the Northern NGO, Christian Outreach, in Cambodia. Although its original name "Agriculture, Business and Community Development" (ABCD) implies a pre-set agenda, the organisation's agenda was to follow the people's agenda. The programme is a planned structure of village level animators working with elected village development committees to facilitate change. The programmes single statement vision is "to increase peoples ability to initiate change and make choices in an environment of loving relationships". This was interpreted into a logical framework, and in 1994 was part funded by the Overseas Development Agency, Tear Fund(UK), Tear Fund(Holland) and a number of smaller donor contributions. It continues to be implemented by Christian Outreach, although there is planned capacity building of the staff to create a local NGO that will continue replication after the life of the given programme.

Without wishing to delve too much into the details of the programme, the reader of this paper needs to understand the focus of the work. The emphasis is not on physical change of the villages, but on the awareness change of the people. Physical activities are greatly needed, and occur as a part of the programme. However, the objectives of the programme, as stated above, are more to do with the awareness of people than with the physical. The method of the programme is indeed to use a sequence of projects to create the opportunity for dialogue. After a first small project which is on a shared cost basis, the programme animates a village controlled revolving fund for future activities. It emphasises a hands off approach to the fund by the organisation, and the organisations main activity is animation.

Animation

What is animation? It is a particular skill that enables other people to find their potential. In the programme, the village animator will visit the village regularly (but not live there) developing relationships and generally being friendly. The village development committee will meet and invite the animator to join their meeting. At the meeting the animator will ask questions to enable the thinking processes of the committee, but will not make suggestions or provide information. For the first six months of the relationship, the animator is under guidelines not to provide any information other than personal details. If he is asked the price of a handpump, he must reflect the question back so that the VDC are encouraged to find their own information through local sources (in this case it would mean bicycling to town, about half an hour, and asking a merchant). After six months, depending on the relationship, the guidelines are relaxed a little but are situational. This guideline is to counter the initial expectations of dependency expressed by the village towards the NGO. VDC meeting are open to anyone from the village and frequently involve more people than just the committee.

The animator will also walk through the village, responding to invitation to come and sit and talk. Once more the main role of the animator is to ask questions. Transparency is encouraged by asking whether the people know what the VDC are doing. Again if they say they do not, and ask the animator, then they are redirected to go and ask the committee.

As stated above, this paper is not intended to be a full description of the programme or of its methodology. Further details can be found in programme reports and in various papers.

Of relevance to our discussion here, is the open ended nature of the animators role. In the recent past, agricultural extension workers, a job which bears some similarity with an animator, were conduits for information. The role of the extension worker was to develop relationships, and at the opportune moment to provide crucial information for improving the farming system. The animator of ABCD has a much more open agenda. Their agenda is to be an agent of change - but what change and in what form?

The problem of open ended discussions

The open ended nature of the job made training, practice and monitoring very difficult. How can the skill of listening to answers and asking open but related questions be taught? Probing questions revealing a problem then need analytical questions to facilitate the people's analysis.

Free form thinking is often difficult and threatening in any culture. Edward De Bono, originator of the six thinking hat model (De Bono E, 1995), says that free form thinking can lead to:

Emotions. We often have a tendency not to think at all but to rely on instant gut feeling, emotion, and preju-dice as a basis for action.

Helplessness. We may react with feelings of inadequacy: " I don't know how to think about this. I don't know what to do next. "

Confusion. We try to keep everything in mind at once, with a mess as a result

This is especially true in the Khmer culture, where thought actually came under direct attack during some of their history. Meas Nee (Nee M, 1995), leader of a Khmer NGO, writing in the book "Towards Restoring Life - Cambodian Villages" says: " My memories of that time are of the numbness and of trying to stay alive, never to think. Not even to think when people were taken from the road and killed right where I was. I couldn't help so I didn't think. Like drowning, with no power at all...................The education system had broken down. A certain age group had no education at all. There were no books, no paper. It was impossible to understand the complex problems of the country, hard even to tell the story of what had happened. Every institution of society had to be restarted but the people were still passive in the beginning. I felt no dignity at all..............There was a habit of not being able to decide anything. The first step out from numbness was to beg for help but there was no dignity in doing that. "
Meas Nee fled to the border camps, where the international community finally made a move. But even this move was not so helpful as they might have imagined. Meas says
" In the Thai border camp I felt as if I was living under the edge of the roof of someone else's house.......I would feel shame in speaking the Cambodian language. When they (foreigners) treated me with suspicion, as they often did, I felt no longer human.......They came with humanitarian assistance.....But they could so quickly criticise and blame me for no reason I could understand.........This loss of dignity is strong and deep. It is a loss of identity and of value and of power. It is a feeling of being more like a pig than a person. Anyone with authority could say, " I want to beat this man " .
The experience of Meas Nee is the experience of a nation. He was one of the half a million who fled to the border camps. The remainder stayed behind to continue with a low level civil war for the next decade or more. He reminds us:-

" You cannot easily change the damage caused by the war, or caused by the systematic breaking of relationships, or the loss of dignity. You cannot easily reverse the situation "lack of food". You cannot easily change the damage done by the meetings held in fear, or the meetings at which people were harangued by propaganda. The mind is paralysed by such things so the way forward is slowly carefully "

How then can animators be trained to move forward " slowly carefully " . In practice, the team found that it was very difficult to train new staff. The only method that seemed to work was some form of apprenticeship, and even then the new animator did not necessarily realise why the old hand had asked a particular question at a particular point in the conversations. To the untrained observer conversations could seem interesting but pointless. Alternatively, the trainee would sometimes see a conversation in one village as prescriptive of all conversations. In attempts to mimic the dialogue, the new animator would force the conversation down the road that he had seen before in another village.

What was needed was a framework for talking about conversations.

Six Hat Thinking - a framework for open ended conversations

The framework tool that was found was a model created by Edward De Bono in the context of education and management challenges. Mr De Bono is a renowned thinker and has popularised a number of creative thinking methods. Lateral thinking is perhaps his most famous. He uses the techniques in management workshops for large international companies, and encourages them to be used in schools in the States and Europe (although they do not seem common yet in the British system). The tool was originally found in a book written for parents called "Teach You Child How to Think" by Edward De Bono (De Bono E, 1989). It was purchased for the education of the Programme Leader's 12 year old daughter.

The six thinking hats method is a simple and practical way of overcoming all three difficulties of creative thinking described above. De Bono (De Bono E, 1995) says:-
" Emotions are an important part of thinking and, in the end, all decisions and choices are made on the basis of our feelings. Emotions at the right place in thinking are essen-tial. Emotions at the wrong place can be disastrous. The six hats method allows us to use emotions and feelings at the right place.

Helplessness arises when we do not have any general-purpose thinking actions that can be taken. The six hats method provides us with a basic framework for thinking ac-tions. There are now definite " next steps " that can be taken.

Confusion arises when we try to do too much at once. Often when we try to think about something, our minds go off in several different directions at the same time. The six hats method allows us to take one direction at a time. "

It was initially introduced to facilitate staff discussions, and rapidly gained favour as a means of describing village conversations. Its potential for being a framework for open discussions was soon acknowledged, and it has now become an invaluable tool for the programme. It also has potential as a monitoring tool for the management of the programme, and these roles are described below.

What is six hat thinking?

We have said that unstructured thinking can be emotional, confusing and unhelpful. Without a framework, creative thinking jumps around, and it is difficult to reach a resolution. The six hat model suggests that there are six basic types of thinking represented by six coloured hats. Each mode, type or hat can be used at different points in a thinking process to limit the boundaries of thought.

Each of the colours of the hat has some connection to an image to aid memory of the type of thinking. Interestingly while most of the colours crossed into the culture of the Khmers, the association of black with judgement was a strange concept. The six hats are as follows (De Bono E, 1991):-

White Hat

White suggests paper. The white hat concerns information. When we wear the white hat, we ask the following kinds of questions: "What information do we have?; 'What information do we need?; 'What question should we be asking? The white hat is used to direct attention to available or missing information.

Red Hat

Red suggests fire and warmth. The red hat is to do with feelings, intuition, and emotions. You may not know the reasons why you like something, or why you do not like something. When the red hat is in use, you have the opportunity to put forward your feelings and intuitions without any explanation at all. Your feelings exist, and the red hat gives you permission to put those feelings forward.

Black Hat

This is probably the most useful hat. It is certainly the hat that is most often used. Black reminds us of a judge's robes. The black hat is for caution. The black hat stops us from doing things that may be harmful. The black hat points out the risks, and why something may not work. Without the black hat we would be in trouble all the time. However, the black hat should not be over-used, as over-use may be dangerous.

Green Hat

Green suggests vegetation, which suggests growth, energy, and life. The green hat is the energy hat. Under the green hat, you put forward proposals and suggestions and propose new ideas and alternatives. Under the green hat you suggest modifications and variations for a suggested idea. The green hat allows you to put forward possibilities. When the green hat is in use, everyone makes an effort to be creative.

Blue Hat

The blue hat is for looking at the thinking process itself: "what should we do next?"; "what have we achieved so far?" We use the blue hat at the beginning of a discussion in order to define what we are thinking about, and to decide what we want to have achieved at the end of our thinking. The blue hat may be used to order the sequence of hats that we are going to be using, and to summarise what we have achieved.

Yellow Hat

Yellow suggests sunshine and optimism. Under the yellow hat we make a direct effort to find the values and benefits in a suggestion: 'What is good about this?" Even if we do not like the idea, the yellow hat asks us to seek out the good points. Where are the benefits?"; "Who is going to benefit?"; "How will the benefits come about?"; "What are the different values?"

Using the hats

When using the hat model there are a number of key points:-

Putting on and taking off the hats (metaphorically) enables a thinker to be able to switch roles.

The hats are not meant to put people into categories. It is totally wrong to say, "She's a green hat thinker" or "He only uses the red hat."

The pur-pose and value of the six hats method is to get peo-ple to use all six modes of thinking.

Hat thinking can detach your ego from the thinking. De Bono suggests that "our egos get attached to an idea or an argument. We cannot stand back in order to be objective".

Hat thinking is particularly useful for an argumentative culture.

Although the Khmer culture is not an argumentative one, it is nevertheless worth looking at this last point in more detail. In our western culture one of the main ways to discuss a matter is to take a counter position. For instance, if person A suggests a carpet is nice, and person B agrees the conversation grinds to a halt. However if B disagrees, then A and B may explore the details of the carpet, each trying to prove their point. The depth of the pile, the number of threads, the colour will all be explored in the conversation. Hat thinking is a way of exploring a subject without having to take a counter position.

Six hat thinking used with programme staff in Cambodia

The first use of hat thinking in the ABCD programme came in the context of staff training. The first hat thinking was introduced as part of the development value workshop (Batchelor S, 1994). This workshop was to get the staff to explore their own values and the values of the programme. The main stimulant for this was a number of exercises such as lifelines, worldview drawings and development problem codes. However to encourage exploration of the development codes, hat thinking was used to frame the discussion.

Its introduction was practised by investigating a newspaper article on the shooting of two Serbian planes by Nato. The example is given below (Batchelor S, 1995). The participants of this discussion were a number of Khmer managers from a number of different NGOs, international and local.

White hat

In this example the main information source is the newspaper article. On initial reading the participants talked about the UN (since they were familiar with the UNTAC). They also talked about how the Serbs had bombed the Bosnians, and were shot down in retaliation. Careful re-reading and an encouragement to do white hat thinking showed that it was NATO not the UN that shot them down and that they had not been seen bombing but that the NATO pilots "thought" they had or were about to bomb.

White hat clarified the facts and was used to remove the sort of assumed bias that the group had i.e. in this case that any international action must be UN.

Red hat

In the example people were asked what they felt about the article. Nearly all agreed that they felt that it was right to stop the bombing and therefore they felt pleased that NATO had taken a strong position against an aggressor.

Black hat

In the example the people were then asked after white and red hats only, to make a decision. They answered unanimously that it was good for NATO to shoot and stop aggression.

Note the use of black hat was slightly modified from the original model, see below.

Blue hat

People were then encouraged to put on their blue hats. They discussed why they were talking about this, answering that they were seeking to explore all the ideas found within this article. They decided they needed more information. They explored beyond the immediate article to discuss what they knew of the Serb conflict, what they knew about NATO and its current involvement, what was the relationship between NATO and the UN, who had the mandate to work to world peace, etc. As a result of this sort of questioning, the group found that they did not know enough about the relationship between NATO and the UN, or about the conflict as a whole.

Yellow hat

The group asked themselves the question, what would be the outcome of this action. The immediate yellow hat said that it would stop the Serbs bombing and killing other people. But using the modified yellow hat to include all future scenarios (see below), the discussion went on to look at some alternatives:- that it may draw NATO into a war with the Serbs, that it may escalate the war, that it may stop the war, that the war may spread as Russia joins the Serbs.

Green hat

The green hat thinking provoked the question "what were the alternatives to killing those Serb pilots?" The group came up with a number of ideas such as an arms embargo, fuel embargo, total embargo, a stronger verbal threat, waiting until they land and then stealing their aircraft, peace marches, placing important people in the Bosnian towns. For each new idea we then went back to blue and yellow hat thinking. As a group of Cambodians with limited access to the international news, they were not aware of the efforts of arms embargoes and again information was in short supply.

Using the hats together, the group worked through the green hat ideas, using the hats to sift the good from the bad. Finally the group was asked to make a decision again on the validity of the action. The group was now split. Many felt it was the wrong thing to do, and that it might have terrible consequences and they questioned Nato's right to do it.

When they were then asked to come up with a joint statement, they changed their statement from the previous one. They now stated that NATO was right to shoot the planes IF they had the mandate of the UN behind them. They felt the mandate of the UN to NATO was a critical thing as to whether the war would escalate or not. The group did not know if the UN was involved and therefore their statement gave the two scenarios. If the UN backed NATO, then the shooting was OK, but if it did not then NATO was in the wrong and should not have downed the Serbian aeroplanes.

The above describes the first use of hat thinking by a group of Khmers. Although the example is perhaps a little obscure, it shows how an open ended conversation can be framed by the use of the hats.

Cultural modifications

It should be noted that there were some modifications made to the basic De Bono model to facilitate its use in Cambodia.

The black hat was attributed to decision making much more than weaknesses. This was done because groups generally find it difficult to make decisions - no one wants to lose face by making the wrong decision. By introducing and emphasising use of black hat to reach a decision, this legitimised a decision without tying it to the ego of the person.

To rebalance the model, the yellow hat was said to be the future consequences of the potential action, with a "slight bias to the positive". Therefore at some points a person will speak of a possible negative outcome (weakness) of a suggestion while using the yellow hat.

Finally the blue hat was used to incorporate the "why" questions. As well as thinking about the process of thinking, the blue is also used to think about why a piece of information exists, or why something causes something else, to look at the much broader picture.

These modifications are not critical to the general use of the model, and we would recommend that anyone using this technique start with the original De Bono model adapting it as and when necessary.

The six hat model has also been used in staff training in Tanzania by Christian Outreach. The cultural modification required there was one of changing hats to jackets. As people who rarely wear hats, the Rwandans preferred the idea of six jacket thinking (Cooke J, 1996).

Six hat thinking used in Khmer Villages

After use of the hat thinking in training sessions, the staff were encouraged to use it in their animation work in the villages.

The programme leader suggested that most people make a cursory look at the presented information, make an emotional response to it and make some sort of decision. The staff agreed that this was the usual process for thinking in the village. It was said that people "naturally" do white, red and black hat thinking, albeit often incomplete and not in any depth. They decided that what was required was more blue, green and yellow hat thinking. Indeed at one point the staff proposed that the objectives be changed to "to get the people to do blue, green and yellow hat thinking" (Batchelor S, 1995).

The staff did not teach the villagers the principles of six hat thinking from the start. They evolved a method whereby open ended discussions were guided in their own minds by the six hats. The hat model provided a framework to enable an analysis of the discussion. Animators found that they could now track a conversation. If the conversation had been dominated by white and red comments, they would specifically ask a blue or green question. Using questions, the animators used the hat model in the villages.

A typical discussion is given below.

	White hat In discussing a problem concerning water supplies in a village, this hat would be used to ask questions - where does the water come from, what do we know about its source, who collects the water, who uses it, how much is used, who drills for water, etc. White hat clarifies the facts. It tries to remove the assumed bias that people have, i.e. that there is enough water below ground if only we had the means to dig for it. It checks that there is actual knowledge that there is water below ground, or forces the participants to discuss how to get that knowledge.
	Red hat In the above example people might say that they need more water, that they feel it would make life easier, that their children might become less sick. It might also allow for someone to say that they don't "like" handpumps and want an open well (actual statement). It gives legitimacy to hearing peoples feelings on the subject.
	Black hat In the above discussion on water supplies, they may decide to work together to dig a well, or to fund a community supply to be contracted to a driller.
	Blue hat Continuing the example, people who were encouraged to put on their blue hats might ask - why are we discussing the water supply? They may have been fixated on an open well. The blue hat may draw the discussion back to its roots. The aim of the discussion may not be to get more water, but to help the village prosper. This naturally would lead into green hat thinking. On the other hand, the blue hat may widen the discussion to include relationships. A good site for obtaining water, may not be the best site to encourage neighbourliness. The blue hat stimulates discussion on the wider issues. Often blue hat thinking reveals that the group or individual does not have enough information to be able to proceed with a sensible analysis. It often forces the thinker to go out and gather new information.
	Yellow hat A new water point would give opportunity for growing vegetables which in turn might benefit the economy of the village.
	Green hat The thinking so far might have been on an open well. However a green hat question would be - what else can be purchased for $250? One of the answers is several handpumps. In an excellent example of green hat thinking one village proposed using some money allocated to handpumps to purchase drilling equipment. After drilling for free their own villages wells they then set up a business which provided a service to other villages. The profits were fed back into the village fund. This village now has the most handpumps of all the villages!

The above describes the hats and illustrates their use in a group discussion. The process is iterative - in a discussion one does not just go white, red, blue green yellow and black. One might use white, red, blue, red, yellow, blue, green, red, black. De Bono suggests sequences for conflict resolution, in-service planning, strategic planning, conflict avoidance amongst others. But the possibility of being able to check that at least in the conversation somewhere all the hats were covered - either in the group or even just in the animators mind, that is very useful.

At a later date some key villagers had the complete model explained to them. A T-shirt was created which had coloured hats sitting on a teapot and some drinking cups. The slogan in Khmer said "Think about development". These T-shirts were given to committee members as an encouragement and as a code. After the T-shirt distribution, many people asked what the drawing meant. This gave the animators an opportunity to explain the six hat thinking model and encourage its more explicit use.

Hat thinking - a monitoring tool

This is a practical monitoring tool for management of the programme. The manager cannot be at every animation meeting. A village could be very active in terms of installing handpumps and buying buffaloes but how will the manager know that there is movement toward the objective of "increased initiative (thinking)". The animator might be telling the VDC all the ideas, and ruling them like a dictator!

With the hat model it is possible to ask the animator - please tell me a blue hat question you asked in the village of Tang Lang, or please tell me a green hat response from the village of Prey Setun this week. In the initial circumstances it is possible that the animator might think of a few ideas himself and lie, but it is not sustainable for an individual to continually think of new angles to life in the village. In order to be able to answer his manager who asks for examples of blue, green and yellow thinking, the animator needs to be asking the people.

In addition, it becomes possible to have staff meetings and encourage the use of blue, green and yellow thinking. Staff are often the first line of action in a programme like ABCD. One cannot expect them to animate the villagers into wider and deeper thinking if they themselves are parochial. Staff meetings can thus discuss problems and work through examples of blue, green and yellow hat thinking.

The extract in Figure 2 from the notes of an Khmer animator illustrates how the model has permeated the staff thinking.

Conclusion

Our experience of the six hat thinking model for creating a framework, setting boundaries and guiding open ended conversations is limited but promising. The model has become a central tool for the participatory programme of ABCD implemented by Christian Outreach in Cambodia. This programme benefits almost 22,000 people by animating key members of the community to be proactive towards change in the village. The programme has had considerable and notable success in technology transfer and agricultural improvement even though its emphasis is on the awareness levels of people's thinking.

While its impact is a combination of many features of the programme, the six hat thinking model created by Edward De Bono, adapted by the author has played a significant role. It is a useful tool for guiding open ended conversations and thereby allowing the people of the programme to go through the process of discovery. It also has a strong role to play in disarming emotions, and preventing conflict.

This paper has shared our experience in using this tool and we would encourage other participatory programme to consider its applications.

References

1. Christian Outreach (1993), "Agriculture, Business and Community Development, Proposal 1994-98", Christian Outreach, NGO, Cambodia/UK,

2. De Bono E (1995), "Mind Games", Dorling Kindersley, UK

3. Nee M (1995), "Towards Restoring Life, Cambodian Villages", OSB/JSRC, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

4. De Bono E (1989), "Teach Your Child How to Think", Penguin Publishers

5. De Bono E (1991), "Six Thinking Hats for schools, Resource book for Adult Educators", Perfection Learning, Logan, Iowa, USA,.

6. Batchelor SJ (1994), "Human Resource - Development Workshop", Appendix to "ABCD Final Report Yr 93/94", Christian Outreach, NGO, Cambodia.

7. Batchelor SJ (1995), "ABCD Final Report Yr 94/95", Christian Outreach, NGO, Cambodia.

8. Cooke J (1996), former ABCD staff undertaking workshop in Tanzania, Private communication.

Figure 2 - Extract of animator notes from ABCD programme.

" They want 50 Buffaloes, it means 2 per family. I asked them why they have no buffaloes and why you want 2 per family. They said they plough with 2. If they have one they can not plough. Then I asked what did they use to plough last year and the year before. They said they ploughed with their families and that some families hired animals from another village. I asked whether those families can work with their family. They said yes they can. Said a lady, "if we give one and one not, may be there will be jealousy". I asked how we can stop jealousy. A man said to stop jealousy we buy every family a bag of fertiliser. Then I put on my blue hat. Now you mention three things treadles, buffaloes and fertiliser, which one is the highest risk. One man said buffaloes, one man said treadle and a lady said fertiliser. I ask why? She said "when we put the fertiliser on the field and it does not rain, then the fertiliser is gone, if I have one buffalo and it does not rain I still have my animal (I think she really wants a buffalo for her family!). ......... then they wear their green hat. One man said now he has a new idea. "I do not want all treadles or all buffaloes, we would like 11 treadles and 6 buffaloes.............. "

Krajap 1, new village 1st action, Programme notes from Prog Asst Sross, Jan. 95

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