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Have you ever known someone who just “knew” what people needed? Or who could easily ask questions to get at the heart of some issue or challenge? Or who could just look at something and predict that there would be a problem? All of these abilities stem from a single valuable skill: Critical observation.

What is critical observation?

Critical observation is the ability to notice subtle details that allow us to maneuver situations more tactfully.

Importantly, critical observation is different from “critical thinking.” Critical thinking involves skills that allow a person to analyze facts and information to reach some decision or conclusion. Critical observation, on the other hand, involves skills in reading a person, process, or situation to get new information. People who are good at critical observation often notice things that other people might miss.

Many business leaders simply assume that this skill is something people are born with: “People either have it, or they don’t.” On the contrary, we have found that it is something that can be taught and sharpened through training.

That’s a good thing because critical observation is one of the most essential soft skills a person can have in business today. And as with most skills, it may be easier to train your employees in it than to find it already developed in the talent pool.

An Example of Critical Observation in the Workplace

Sometimes real-life examples of critical observation are hard to spot (ironically). Sharing a good example I’ve seen can help us understand why this skill is so important for developing your people and growing your organization.

Take a fairly common occurrence, like an employee who is struggling to meet his deadlines (yet turns in great work overall). Your typical manager might try all sorts of incentives or threats to get him to turn in the work on time. Should those fail and the situation not improve, the manager will either terminate the employee or simply manage timelines around the late work.

But now let’s imagine a manager with sharp critical observation skills. They might notice that the employee here only has trouble with deadlines that fall on the third week of the month. Asking some delicate questions, they find out that this is due to child care issues. Now knowing this, the manager encourages an earlier start on the project if it’s a hard deadline, or offer flexibility to work from home.

Had this pattern not been observed, the manager would have assumed the employee was being inefficient and then placed more pressure and scrutiny on him, ultimately leading to the departure of an otherwise great producer. Instead, the manager was able to assess the situation and make it work for the employee, guaranteeing good, consistent work.

Remember, most managers with this skill didn’t come by it naturally. They had to learn it.

Two Types of Critical Observation

My teams have found that there are two basic types of critical observation: Observation of people, and observation of processes. As it turns out, you can train people to help sharpen both of these types of skills.

People who are good critical observers of other people know how to listen carefully and observe. They are the kinds of employees who are considered to have high “emotional intelligence.” The manager above is a good example.

There are other people, though, who have better critical observation skills when it comes to processes . These are people who catch mistakes early, both their own and others’. They have a feel for what they don’t know, ask questions, and are naturally curious.

A person can be good at one or the other, or both. Each type simply involves a slightly different set of skills, and so training for each requires developing a different skill set.

Training to Help with the Critical Observation of People

What sorts of skills help when working with people? Here are a few training topic examples:

Active Listening

Active listening is the skill of listening attentively to people and striving to first understand them. It requires that the listener concentrate on what is being said, indicate that they are listening, and confirm their understanding. In other words, to listen actively, you have to pay attention. You can’t multitask, you can’t avoid eye contact, you can’t assume, and you can’t be formulating your response in your head. People can be trained to do these things, which greatly improves communication within and across teams.

Analyzing Performance Issues

Few teams achieve 100% of their goals 100% of the time. There are different reasons that might be. Sometimes people lack the ability to perform, sometimes they lack the motivation to perform, and sometimes they lack both. A person with good critical observation skills understands the difference between “can do” and “will do” and can figure out which is the roadblock to performance.

Emotional Intelligence

When we better understand emotions—our own and those of our co-workers and employees—we can better handle stress, resolve conflict, and ultimately produce better work. A large part of critical observation of people involves workplace empathy. It’s not WHAT the person did, it’s WHY and HOW that matters.

Personality Styles

People with high critical observation skills can best apply them to people when they know what to look for. For example, you can often understand what creates functional teams, and what might lead to conflict, when understanding the “DISC” style of your employees. (“DISC” stands for the four personality types in the model: D ominance, I nfluence, S teadiness, and C onscientiousness.) Once you know about these different types, you’ll start seeing them everywhere. Being aware of these styles, in yourself and others, can help you to participate in, and manage, teams better.

Unconscious Bias

Even if we consider ourselves open-minded and fair people, unconscious biases can sneak in and color our perceptions of people. Those who have trained up their critical observation skills are most aware of their potential unconscious biases and actively work to correct for them. ( You can view a full course from our series on unconscious bias .)

Training to Help with the Critical Observation of Processes

Critical observation of people is important because almost all of us have to work with people. There is also a lot of value to seeing things critically when looking at processes.

Knowing What We Don’t Know

There are things that people know, and they know that they know them. There are also things that people don’t know, and they are aware that they do not, in fact, know them. But each of us also has a long list of things we don’t know, and don’t know that we don’t know . People who are critical observers are always on the lookout for what they don’t know, so they can learn and improve. Learning to spot what we don’t yet know is a valuable skill in any organization.

Discovering the Root Cause of a Problem

People who are keen observers of processes have a knack for “getting to the bottom of things.” They can zero in on the cause of a problem, even if that cause is not obvious to the casual observer. You can train employees to have this “knack” by instructing them in a method such as “The 5 Whys,” which they can use to find actionable solutions to problems. I’ll note, too, that the better your employees get at critical observation, the better they will be able to find answers to “why?” questions! (Preview our course on The 5 Whys .)

Seeing Problems Differently

Not all questions have straightforward answers, and not all problems are easily solved. Sometimes it takes a good dose of creativity to understand what the real problem is, and how it can be fixed. This, too, is a critical observation skill that can be trained—and doing so often has a huge impact on the bottom line.

All of the topics I’ve mentioned above are available as training courses from HSI with a free trial of our HSI LMS . We also have some sample videos available in our video library , which you can sample without any obligation.

Additional Resources

• View two of the courses mentioned above on unconscious bias and the 5 whys.
• How to Buy eLearning Content for Your LMS (And Not Regret It Later)
• Situational Awareness Training for Employees

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on March 4, 2016, and has been updated for freshness and comprehensiveness.

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Critical thinking and problem-solving, jump to: , what is critical thinking, characteristics of critical thinking, why teach critical thinking.

• Teaching Strategies to Help Promote Critical Thinking Skills

References and Resources

When examining the vast literature on critical thinking, various definitions of critical thinking emerge. Here are some samples:

• "Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action" (Scriven, 1996).
• "Most formal definitions characterize critical thinking as the intentional application of rational, higher order thinking skills, such as analysis, synthesis, problem recognition and problem solving, inference, and evaluation" (Angelo, 1995, p. 6).
• "Critical thinking is thinking that assesses itself" (Center for Critical Thinking, 1996b).
• "Critical thinking is the ability to think about one's thinking in such a way as 1. To recognize its strengths and weaknesses and, as a result, 2. To recast the thinking in improved form" (Center for Critical Thinking, 1996c).

Perhaps the simplest definition is offered by Beyer (1995) : "Critical thinking... means making reasoned judgments" (p. 8). Basically, Beyer sees critical thinking as using criteria to judge the quality of something, from cooking to a conclusion of a research paper. In essence, critical thinking is a disciplined manner of thought that a person uses to assess the validity of something (statements, news stories, arguments, research, etc.).

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Wade (1995) identifies eight characteristics of critical thinking. Critical thinking involves asking questions, defining a problem, examining evidence, analyzing assumptions and biases, avoiding emotional reasoning, avoiding oversimplification, considering other interpretations, and tolerating ambiguity. Dealing with ambiguity is also seen by Strohm & Baukus (1995) as an essential part of critical thinking, "Ambiguity and doubt serve a critical-thinking function and are a necessary and even a productive part of the process" (p. 56).

Another characteristic of critical thinking identified by many sources is metacognition. Metacognition is thinking about one's own thinking. More specifically, "metacognition is being aware of one's thinking as one performs specific tasks and then using this awareness to control what one is doing" (Jones & Ratcliff, 1993, p. 10 ).

In the book, Critical Thinking, Beyer elaborately explains what he sees as essential aspects of critical thinking. These are:

• Dispositions: Critical thinkers are skeptical, open-minded, value fair-mindedness, respect evidence and reasoning, respect clarity and precision, look at different points of view, and will change positions when reason leads them to do so.
• Criteria: To think critically, must apply criteria. Need to have conditions that must be met for something to be judged as believable. Although the argument can be made that each subject area has different criteria, some standards apply to all subjects. "... an assertion must... be based on relevant, accurate facts; based on credible sources; precise; unbiased; free from logical fallacies; logically consistent; and strongly reasoned" (p. 12).
• Argument: Is a statement or proposition with supporting evidence. Critical thinking involves identifying, evaluating, and constructing arguments.
• Reasoning: The ability to infer a conclusion from one or multiple premises. To do so requires examining logical relationships among statements or data.
• Point of View: The way one views the world, which shapes one's construction of meaning. In a search for understanding, critical thinkers view phenomena from many different points of view.
• Procedures for Applying Criteria: Other types of thinking use a general procedure. Critical thinking makes use of many procedures. These procedures include asking questions, making judgments, and identifying assumptions.

Oliver & Utermohlen (1995) see students as too often being passive receptors of information. Through technology, the amount of information available today is massive. This information explosion is likely to continue in the future. Students need a guide to weed through the information and not just passively accept it. Students need to "develop and effectively apply critical thinking skills to their academic studies, to the complex problems that they will face, and to the critical choices they will be forced to make as a result of the information explosion and other rapid technological changes" (Oliver & Utermohlen, p. 1 ).

As mentioned in the section, Characteristics of Critical Thinking , critical thinking involves questioning. It is important to teach students how to ask good questions, to think critically, in order to continue the advancement of the very fields we are teaching. "Every field stays alive only to the extent that fresh questions are generated and taken seriously" (Center for Critical Thinking, 1996a ).

Beyer sees the teaching of critical thinking as important to the very state of our nation. He argues that to live successfully in a democracy, people must be able to think critically in order to make sound decisions about personal and civic affairs. If students learn to think critically, then they can use good thinking as the guide by which they live their lives.

Teaching Strategies to Help Promote Critical Thinking

The 1995, Volume 22, issue 1, of the journal, Teaching of Psychology , is devoted to the teaching critical thinking. Most of the strategies included in this section come from the various articles that compose this issue.

• CATS (Classroom Assessment Techniques): Angelo stresses the use of ongoing classroom assessment as a way to monitor and facilitate students' critical thinking. An example of a CAT is to ask students to write a "Minute Paper" responding to questions such as "What was the most important thing you learned in today's class? What question related to this session remains uppermost in your mind?" The teacher selects some of the papers and prepares responses for the next class meeting.
• Cooperative Learning Strategies: Cooper (1995) argues that putting students in group learning situations is the best way to foster critical thinking. "In properly structured cooperative learning environments, students perform more of the active, critical thinking with continuous support and feedback from other students and the teacher" (p. 8).
• Case Study /Discussion Method: McDade (1995) describes this method as the teacher presenting a case (or story) to the class without a conclusion. Using prepared questions, the teacher then leads students through a discussion, allowing students to construct a conclusion for the case.
• Using Questions: King (1995) identifies ways of using questions in the classroom:
• Reciprocal Peer Questioning: Following lecture, the teacher displays a list of question stems (such as, "What are the strengths and weaknesses of...). Students must write questions about the lecture material. In small groups, the students ask each other the questions. Then, the whole class discusses some of the questions from each small group.
• Reader's Questions: Require students to write questions on assigned reading and turn them in at the beginning of class. Select a few of the questions as the impetus for class discussion.
• Conference Style Learning: The teacher does not "teach" the class in the sense of lecturing. The teacher is a facilitator of a conference. Students must thoroughly read all required material before class. Assigned readings should be in the zone of proximal development. That is, readings should be able to be understood by students, but also challenging. The class consists of the students asking questions of each other and discussing these questions. The teacher does not remain passive, but rather, helps "direct and mold discussions by posing strategic questions and helping students build on each others' ideas" (Underwood & Wald, 1995, p. 18 ).
• Use Writing Assignments: Wade sees the use of writing as fundamental to developing critical thinking skills. "With written assignments, an instructor can encourage the development of dialectic reasoning by requiring students to argue both [or more] sides of an issue" (p. 24).
• Written dialogues: Give students written dialogues to analyze. In small groups, students must identify the different viewpoints of each participant in the dialogue. Must look for biases, presence or exclusion of important evidence, alternative interpretations, misstatement of facts, and errors in reasoning. Each group must decide which view is the most reasonable. After coming to a conclusion, each group acts out their dialogue and explains their analysis of it.
• Spontaneous Group Dialogue: One group of students are assigned roles to play in a discussion (such as leader, information giver, opinion seeker, and disagreer). Four observer groups are formed with the functions of determining what roles are being played by whom, identifying biases and errors in thinking, evaluating reasoning skills, and examining ethical implications of the content.
• Ambiguity: Strohm & Baukus advocate producing much ambiguity in the classroom. Don't give students clear cut material. Give them conflicting information that they must think their way through.
• Angelo, T. A. (1995). Beginning the dialogue: Thoughts on promoting critical thinking: Classroom assessment for critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 6-7.
• Beyer, B. K. (1995). Critical thinking. Bloomington, IN: Phi Delta Kappa Educational Foundation.
• Center for Critical Thinking (1996a). The role of questions in thinking, teaching, and learning. [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://www.criticalthinking.org/University/univlibrary/library.nclk
• Center for Critical Thinking (1996b). Structures for student self-assessment. [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://www.criticalthinking.org/University/univclass/trc.nclk
• Center for Critical Thinking (1996c). Three definitions of critical thinking [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://www.criticalthinking.org/University/univlibrary/library.nclk
• Cooper, J. L. (1995). Cooperative learning and critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 7-8.
• Jones, E. A. & Ratcliff, G. (1993). Critical thinking skills for college students. National Center on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning, and Assessment, University Park, PA. (Eric Document Reproduction Services No. ED 358 772)
• King, A. (1995). Designing the instructional process to enhance critical thinking across the curriculum: Inquiring minds really do want to know: Using questioning to teach critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22 (1) , 13-17.
• McDade, S. A. (1995). Case study pedagogy to advance critical thinking. Teaching Psychology, 22(1), 9-10.
• Oliver, H. & Utermohlen, R. (1995). An innovative teaching strategy: Using critical thinking to give students a guide to the future.(Eric Document Reproduction Services No. 389 702)
• Robertson, J. F. & Rane-Szostak, D. (1996). Using dialogues to develop critical thinking skills: A practical approach. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 39(7), 552-556.
• Scriven, M. & Paul, R. (1996). Defining critical thinking: A draft statement for the National Council for Excellence in Critical Thinking. [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://www.criticalthinking.org/University/univlibrary/library.nclk
• Strohm, S. M., & Baukus, R. A. (1995). Strategies for fostering critical thinking skills. Journalism and Mass Communication Educator, 50 (1), 55-62.
• Underwood, M. K., & Wald, R. L. (1995). Conference-style learning: A method for fostering critical thinking with heart. Teaching Psychology, 22(1), 17-21.
• Wade, C. (1995). Using writing to develop and assess critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 24-28.

Other Reading

• Bean, J. C. (1996). Engaging ideas: The professor's guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, & active learning in the classroom. Jossey-Bass.
• Bernstein, D. A. (1995). A negotiation model for teaching critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 22-24.
• Carlson, E. R. (1995). Evaluating the credibility of sources. A missing link in the teaching of critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 39-41.
• Facione, P. A., Sanchez, C. A., Facione, N. C., & Gainen, J. (1995). The disposition toward critical thinking. The Journal of General Education, 44(1), 1-25.
• Halpern, D. F., & Nummedal, S. G. (1995). Closing thoughts about helping students improve how they think. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 82-83.
• Isbell, D. (1995). Teaching writing and research as inseparable: A faculty-librarian teaching team. Reference Services Review, 23(4), 51-62.
• Jones, J. M. & Safrit, R. D. (1994). Developing critical thinking skills in adult learners through innovative distance learning. Paper presented at the International Conference on the practice of adult education and social development. Jinan, China. (Eric Document Reproduction Services No. ED 373 159)
• Sanchez, M. A. (1995). Using critical-thinking principles as a guide to college-level instruction. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), 72-74.
• Spicer, K. L. & Hanks, W. E. (1995). Multiple measures of critical thinking skills and predisposition in assessment of critical thinking. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Speech Communication Association, San Antonio, TX. (Eric Document Reproduction Services No. ED 391 185)
• Terenzini, P. T., Springer, L., Pascarella, E. T., & Nora, A. (1995). Influences affecting the development of students' critical thinking skills. Research in Higher Education, 36(1), 23-39.

On the Internet

• Carr, K. S. (1990). How can we teach critical thinking. Eric Digest. [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://ericps.ed.uiuc.edu/eece/pubs/digests/1990/carr90.html
• The Center for Critical Thinking (1996). Home Page. Available HTTP: http://www.criticalthinking.org/University/
• Ennis, Bob (No date). Critical thinking. [On-line], April 4, 1997. Available HTTP: http://www.cof.orst.edu/cof/teach/for442/ct.htm
• Montclair State University (1995). Curriculum resource center. Critical thinking resources: An annotated bibliography. [On-line]. Available HTTP: http://www.montclair.edu/Pages/CRC/Bibliographies/CriticalThinking.html
• No author, No date. Critical Thinking is ... [On-line], April 4, 1997. Available HTTP: http://library.usask.ca/ustudy/critical/
• Sheridan, Marcia (No date). Internet education topics hotlink page. [On-line], April 4, 1997. Available HTTP: http://sun1.iusb.edu/~msherida/topics/critical.html

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How to build critical thinking skills for better decision-making

It’s simple in theory, but tougher in practice – here are five tips to get you started.

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Have you heard the riddle about two coins that equal thirty cents, but one of them is not a nickel? What about the one where a surgeon says they can’t operate on their own son?

Those brain teasers tap into your critical thinking skills. But your ability to think critically isn’t just helpful for solving those random puzzles – it plays a big role in your career. 

An impressive 81% of employers say critical thinking carries a lot of weight when they’re evaluating job candidates. It ranks as the top competency companies consider when hiring recent graduates (even ahead of communication ). Plus, once you’re hired, several studies show that critical thinking skills are highly correlated with better job performance.

So what exactly are critical thinking skills? And even more importantly, how do you build and improve them? 

What is critical thinking?

Critical thinking is the ability to evaluate facts and information, remain objective, and make a sound decision about how to move forward.

Does that sound like how you approach every decision or problem? Not so fast. Critical thinking seems simple in theory but is much tougher in practice, which helps explain why 65% of employers say their organization has a need for more critical thinking. 

In reality, critical thinking doesn’t come naturally to a lot of us. In order to do it well, you need to:

• Remain open-minded and inquisitive, rather than relying on assumptions or jumping to conclusions
• Ask questions and dig deep, rather than accepting information at face value
• Keep your own biases and perceptions in check to stay as objective as possible
• Rely on your emotional intelligence to fill in the blanks and gain a more well-rounded understanding of a situation

So, critical thinking isn’t just being intelligent or analytical. In many ways, it requires you to step outside of yourself, let go of your own preconceived notions, and approach a problem or situation with curiosity and fairness.

It’s a challenge, but it’s well worth it. Critical thinking skills will help you connect ideas, make reasonable decisions, and solve complex problems.

7 critical thinking skills to help you dig deeper

Critical thinking is often labeled as a skill itself (you’ll see it bulleted as a desired trait in a variety of job descriptions). But it’s better to think of critical thinking less as a distinct skill and more as a collection or category of skills. 

To think critically, you’ll need to tap into a bunch of your other soft skills. Here are seven of the most important. 

Open-mindedness

It’s important to kick off the critical thinking process with the idea that anything is possible. The more you’re able to set aside your own suspicions, beliefs, and agenda, the better prepared you are to approach the situation with the level of inquisitiveness you need. 

That means not closing yourself off to any possibilities and allowing yourself the space to pull on every thread – yes, even the ones that seem totally implausible.

As Christopher Dwyer, Ph.D. writes in a piece for Psychology Today , “Even if an idea appears foolish, sometimes its consideration can lead to an intelligent, critically considered conclusion.” He goes on to compare the critical thinking process to brainstorming . Sometimes the “bad” ideas are what lay the foundation for the good ones. 

Open-mindedness is challenging because it requires more effort and mental bandwidth than sticking with your own perceptions. Approaching problems or situations with true impartiality often means:

• Practicing self-regulation : Giving yourself a pause between when you feel something and when you actually react or take action.
• Challenging your own biases: Acknowledging your biases and seeking feedback are two powerful ways to get a broader understanding. 

Critical thinking example

In a team meeting, your boss mentioned that your company newsletter signups have been decreasing and she wants to figure out why.

At first, you feel offended and defensive – it feels like she’s blaming you for the dip in subscribers. You recognize and rationalize that emotion before thinking about potential causes. You have a hunch about what’s happening, but you will explore all possibilities and contributions from your team members.

Observation

Observation is, of course, your ability to notice and process the details all around you (even the subtle or seemingly inconsequential ones). Critical thinking demands that you’re flexible and willing to go beyond surface-level information, and solid observation skills help you do that.

Your observations help you pick up on clues from a variety of sources and experiences, all of which help you draw a final conclusion. After all, sometimes it’s the most minuscule realization that leads you to the strongest conclusion.

Over the next week or so, you keep a close eye on your company’s website and newsletter analytics to see if numbers are in fact declining or if your boss’s concerns were just a fluke. 

Critical thinking hinges on objectivity. And, to be objective, you need to base your judgments on the facts – which you collect through research. You’ll lean on your research skills to gather as much information as possible that’s relevant to your problem or situation. 

Keep in mind that this isn’t just about the quantity of information – quality matters too. You want to find data and details from a variety of trusted sources to drill past the surface and build a deeper understanding of what’s happening. 

You dig into your email and website analytics to identify trends in bounce rates, time on page, conversions, and more. You also review recent newsletters and email promotions to understand what customers have received, look through current customer feedback, and connect with your customer support team to learn what they’re hearing in their conversations with customers.

The critical thinking process is sort of like a treasure hunt – you’ll find some nuggets that are fundamental for your final conclusion and some that might be interesting but aren’t pertinent to the problem at hand.

That’s why you need analytical skills. They’re what help you separate the wheat from the chaff, prioritize information, identify trends or themes, and draw conclusions based on the most relevant and influential facts. 

It’s easy to confuse analytical thinking with critical thinking itself, and it’s true there is a lot of overlap between the two. But analytical thinking is just a piece of critical thinking. It focuses strictly on the facts and data, while critical thinking incorporates other factors like emotions, opinions, and experiences. 

As you analyze your research, you notice that one specific webpage has contributed to a significant decline in newsletter signups. While all of the other sources have stayed fairly steady with regard to conversions, that one has sharply decreased.

You decide to move on from your other hypotheses about newsletter quality and dig deeper into the analytics. 

One of the traps of critical thinking is that it’s easy to feel like you’re never done. There’s always more information you could collect and more rabbit holes you could fall down.

But at some point, you need to accept that you’ve done your due diligence and make a decision about how to move forward. That’s where inference comes in. It’s your ability to look at the evidence and facts available to you and draw an informed conclusion based on those. 

When you’re so focused on staying objective and pursuing all possibilities, inference can feel like the antithesis of critical thinking. But ultimately, it’s your inference skills that allow you to move out of the thinking process and onto the action steps. 

You dig deeper into the analytics for the page that hasn’t been converting and notice that the sharp drop-off happened around the same time you switched email providers.

After looking more into the backend, you realize that the signup form on that page isn’t correctly connected to your newsletter platform. It seems like anybody who has signed up on that page hasn’t been fed to your email list. 

Communication

3 ways to improve your communication skills at work

If and when you identify a solution or answer, you can’t keep it close to the vest. You’ll need to use your communication skills to share your findings with the relevant stakeholders – like your boss, team members, or anybody who needs to be involved in the next steps.

Your analysis skills will come in handy here too, as they’ll help you determine what information other people need to know so you can avoid bogging them down with unnecessary details. 

In your next team meeting, you pull up the analytics and show your team the sharp drop-off as well as the missing connection between that page and your email platform. You ask the web team to reinstall and double-check that connection and you also ask a member of the marketing team to draft an apology email to the subscribers who were missed. 

Problem-solving

Critical thinking and problem-solving are two more terms that are frequently confused. After all, when you think critically, you’re often doing so with the objective of solving a problem.

The best way to understand how problem-solving and critical thinking differ is to think of problem-solving as much more narrow. You’re focused on finding a solution.

In contrast, you can use critical thinking for a variety of use cases beyond solving a problem – like answering questions or identifying opportunities for improvement. Even so, within the critical thinking process, you’ll flex your problem-solving skills when it comes time to take action. 

Once the fix is implemented, you monitor the analytics to see if subscribers continue to increase. If not (or if they increase at a slower rate than you anticipated), you’ll roll out some other tests like changing the CTA language or the placement of the subscribe form on the page.

5 ways to improve your critical thinking skills

Beyond the buzzwords: Why interpersonal skills matter at work

Think critically about critical thinking and you’ll quickly realize that it’s not as instinctive as you’d like it to be. Fortunately, your critical thinking skills are learned competencies and not inherent gifts – and that means you can improve them. Here’s how:

• Practice active listening: Active listening helps you process and understand what other people share. That’s crucial as you aim to be open-minded and inquisitive.
• Ask open-ended questions: If your critical thinking process involves collecting feedback and opinions from others, ask open-ended questions (meaning, questions that can’t be answered with “yes” or “no”). Doing so will give you more valuable information and also prevent your own biases from influencing people’s input.
• Scrutinize your sources: Figuring out what to trust and prioritize is crucial for critical thinking. Boosting your media literacy and asking more questions will help you be more discerning about what to factor in. It’s hard to strike a balance between skepticism and open-mindedness, but approaching information with questions (rather than unquestioning trust) will help you draw better conclusions. 
• Play a game: Remember those riddles we mentioned at the beginning? As trivial as they might seem, games and exercises like those can help you boost your critical thinking skills. There are plenty of critical thinking exercises you can do individually or as a team . 
• Give yourself time: Research shows that rushed decisions are often regrettable ones. That’s likely because critical thinking takes time – you can’t do it under the wire. So, for big decisions or hairy problems, give yourself enough time and breathing room to work through the process. It’s hard enough to think critically without a countdown ticking in your brain. 

Critical thinking really is critical

The ability to think critically is important, but it doesn’t come naturally to most of us. It’s just easier to stick with biases, assumptions, and surface-level information. 

But that route often leads you to rash judgments, shaky conclusions, and disappointing decisions. So here’s a conclusion we can draw without any more noodling: Even if it is more demanding on your mental resources, critical thinking is well worth the effort.

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How to build your critical thinking skills in 7 steps (with examples)

Critical thinking is, well, critical. By building these skills, you improve your ability to analyze information and come to the best decision possible. In this article, we cover the basics of critical thinking, as well as the seven steps you can use to implement the full critical thinking process. 

Critical thinking comes from asking the right questions to come to the best conclusion possible. Strong critical thinkers analyze information from a variety of viewpoints in order to identify the best course of action.

Don’t worry if you don’t think you have strong critical thinking abilities. In this article, we’ll help you build a foundation for critical thinking so you can absorb, analyze, and make informed decisions. 

What is critical thinking? 

Critical thinking is the ability to collect and analyze information to come to a conclusion. Being able to think critically is important in virtually every industry and applicable across a wide range of positions. That’s because critical thinking isn’t subject-specific—rather, it’s your ability to parse through information, data, statistics, and other details in order to identify a satisfactory solution. 

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Top 8 critical thinking skills

Like most soft skills, critical thinking isn’t something you can take a class to learn. Rather, this skill consists of a variety of interpersonal and analytical skills. Developing critical thinking is more about learning to embrace open-mindedness and bringing analytical thinking to your problem framing process. 

In no particular order, the eight most important critical thinking skills are:

Analytical thinking: Part of critical thinking is evaluating data from multiple sources in order to come to the best conclusions. Analytical thinking allows people to reject bias and strive to gather and consume information to come to the best conclusion. 

Open-mindedness: This critical thinking skill helps you analyze and process information to come to an unbiased conclusion. Part of the critical thinking process is letting your personal biases go and coming to a conclusion based on all of the information. 

Problem solving : Because critical thinking emphasizes coming to the best conclusion based on all of the available information, it’s a key part of problem solving. When used correctly, critical thinking helps you solve any problem—from a workplace challenge to difficulties in everyday life. 

Self-regulation: Self-regulation refers to the ability to regulate your thoughts and set aside any personal biases to come to the best conclusion. In order to be an effective critical thinker, you need to question the information you have and the decisions you favor—only then can you come to the best conclusion. 

Observation: Observation skills help critical thinkers look for things beyond face value. To be a critical thinker you need to embrace multiple points of view, and you can use observation skills to identify potential problems.

Interpretation: Not all data is made equal—and critical thinkers know this. In addition to gathering information, it’s important to evaluate which information is important and relevant to your situation. That way, you can draw the best conclusions from the data you’ve collected. 

Evaluation: When you attempt to answer a hard question, there is rarely an obvious answer. Even though critical thinking emphasizes putting your biases aside, you need to be able to confidently make a decision based on the data you have available. 

Communication: Once a decision has been made, you also need to share this decision with other stakeholders. Effective workplace communication includes presenting evidence and supporting your conclusion—especially if there are a variety of different possible solutions. 

7 steps to critical thinking

Critical thinking is a skill that you can build by following these seven steps. The seven steps to critical thinking help you ensure you’re approaching a problem from the right angle, considering every alternative, and coming to an unbiased conclusion.

 First things first: When to use the 7 step critical thinking process

There’s a lot that goes into the full critical thinking process, and not every decision needs to be this thought out. Sometimes, it’s enough to put aside bias and approach a process logically. In other, more complex cases, the best way to identify the ideal outcome is to go through the entire critical thinking process. 

The seven-step critical thinking process is useful for complex decisions in areas you are less familiar with. Alternatively, the seven critical thinking steps can help you look at a problem you’re familiar with from a different angle, without any bias. 

If you need to make a less complex decision, consider another problem solving strategy instead. Decision matrices are a great way to identify the best option between different choices. Check out our article on 7 steps to creating a decision matrix .

1. Identify the problem

Before you put those critical thinking skills to work, you first need to identify the problem you’re solving. This step includes taking a look at the problem from a few different perspectives and asking questions like: 

What’s happening? 

Why is this happening? 

What assumptions am I making? 

At first glance, how do I think we can solve this problem? 

A big part of developing your critical thinking skills is learning how to come to unbiased conclusions. In order to do that, you first need to acknowledge the biases that you currently have. Does someone on your team think they know the answer? Are you making assumptions that aren’t necessarily true? Identifying these details helps you later on in the process. 

2. Research

At this point, you likely have a general idea of the problem—but in order to come up with the best solution, you need to dig deeper. 

During the research process, collect information relating to the problem, including data, statistics, historical project information, team input, and more. Make sure you gather information from a variety of sources, especially if those sources go against your personal ideas about what the problem is or how to solve it.

Gathering varied information is essential for your ability to apply the critical thinking process. If you don’t get enough information, your ability to make a final decision will be skewed. Remember that critical thinking is about helping you identify the objective best conclusion. You aren’t going with your gut—you’re doing research to find the best option

3. Determine data relevance

Just as it’s important to gather a variety of information, it is also important to determine how relevant the different information sources are. After all, just because there is data doesn’t mean it’s relevant. 

Once you’ve gathered all of the information, sift through the noise and identify what information is relevant and what information isn’t. Synthesizing all of this information and establishing significance helps you weigh different data sources and come to the best conclusion later on in the critical thinking process. 

To determine data relevance, ask yourself:

How reliable is this information? 

How significant is this information? 

Is this information outdated? Is it specialized in a specific field? 

4. Ask questions

One of the most useful parts of the critical thinking process is coming to a decision without bias. In order to do so, you need to take a step back from the process and challenge the assumptions you’re making. 

We all have bias—and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Unconscious biases (also known as cognitive biases) often serve as mental shortcuts to simplify problem solving and aid decision making. But even when biases aren’t inherently bad, you must be aware of your biases in order to put them aside when necessary. 

Before coming to a solution, ask yourself:

Am I making any assumptions about this information? 

Are there additional variables I haven’t considered? 

Have I evaluated the information from every perspective? 

Are there any viewpoints I missed? 

5. Identify the best solution

Finally, you’re ready to come to a conclusion. To identify the best solution, draw connections between causes and effects. Use the facts you’ve gathered to evaluate the most objective conclusion. 

Keep in mind that there may be more than one solution. Often, the problems you’re facing are complex and intricate. The critical thinking process doesn’t necessarily lead to a cut-and-dry solution—instead, the process helps you understand the different variables at play so you can make an informed decision. 

6. Present your solution

Communication is a key skill for critical thinkers. It isn’t enough to think for yourself—you also need to share your conclusion with other project stakeholders. If there are multiple solutions, present them all. There may be a case where you implement one solution, then test to see if it works before implementing another solution. 

7. Analyze your decision

The seven-step critical thinking process yields a result—and you then need to put that solution into place. After you’ve implemented your decision, evaluate whether or not it was effective. Did it solve the initial problem? What lessons—whether positive or negative—can you learn from this experience to improve your critical thinking for next time? 

Depending on how your team shares information, consider documenting lessons learned in a central source of truth. That way, team members that are making similar or related decisions in the future can understand why you made the decision you made and what the outcome was. 

Example of critical thinking in the workplace

Imagine you work in user experience design (UX). Your team is focused on pricing and packaging and ensuring customers have a clear understanding of the different services your company offers. Here’s how to apply the critical thinking process in the workplace in seven steps: 

Start by identifying the problem

Your current pricing page isn’t performing as well as you want. You’ve heard from customers that your services aren’t clear, and that the page doesn’t answer the questions they have. This page is really important for your company, since it’s where your customers sign up for your service. You and your team have a few theories about why your current page isn’t performing well, but you decide to apply the critical thinking process to ensure you come to the best decision for the page. 

Gather information about how the problem started

Part of identifying the problem includes understanding how the problem started. The pricing and packaging page is important—so when your team initially designed the page, they certainly put a lot of thought into it. Before you begin researching how to improve the page, ask yourself: 

Why did you design the pricing page the way you did? 

Which stakeholders need to be involved in the decision making process? 

Where are users getting stuck on the page?

Are any features currently working?

Then, you research

In addition to understanding the history of the pricing and packaging page, it’s important to understand what works well. Part of this research means taking a look at what your competitor’s pricing pages look like. 

Ask yourself: 

How have our competitors set up their pricing pages?

Are there any pricing page best practices? 

How does color, positioning, and animation impact navigation? 

Are there any standard page layouts customers expect to see? 

Organize and analyze information

You’ve gathered all of the information you need—now you need to organize and analyze it. What trends, if any, are you noticing? Is there any particularly relevant or important information that you have to consider? 

Ask open-ended questions to reduce bias

In the case of critical thinking, it’s important to address and set bias aside as much as possible. Ask yourself: 

Is there anything I’m missing? 

Have I connected with the right stakeholders? 

Are there any other viewpoints I should consider? 

Determine the best solution for your team

You now have all of the information you need to design the best pricing page. Depending on the complexity of the design, you may want to design a few options to present to a small group of customers or A/B test on the live website.

Present your solution to stakeholders

Critical thinking can help you in every element of your life, but in the workplace, you must also involve key project stakeholders . Stakeholders help you determine next steps, like whether you’ll A/B test the page first. Depending on the complexity of the issue, consider hosting a meeting or sharing a status report to get everyone on the same page. 

Analyze the results

No process is complete without evaluating the results. Once the new page has been live for some time, evaluate whether it did better than the previous page. What worked? What didn’t? This also helps you make better critical decisions later on.

Critically successful 

Critical thinking takes time to build, but with effort and patience you can apply an unbiased, analytical mind to any situation. Critical thinking makes up one of many soft skills that makes you an effective team member, manager, and worker. If you’re looking to hone your skills further, read our article on the 25 project management skills you need to succeed . 

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7 important observation skills (and how to assess them)

Test your candidate’s observation skills for free.

Let’s face it: Without observation skills, even the most talented people turn in poor-quality work.

People with good observation skills, on the other hand, pay close attention to detail, think critically, and work well with others.

Luckily, it’s easy to spot perceptive, hard-working employees by testing for observation skills with talent assessments.

Keep reading to find out the best personality traits, how to improve observation skills, and how to test observation skills with talent assessments .

Table of contents

7 fundamental examples of observation skills, how to develop observation skills: 5 tips, how to assess observation skills: 5 assessments, test observation skills and hire conscientious candidates, testing observation skills faqs.

Okay, so why are observation skills important in practice? To dig deep into that question, we need to look at some examples of highly transferable observation skills.

Observation as a skill set: Why are observation skills important?

1. Contextual awareness

Understanding context at work means being aware of things that affect your decision-making .

You might need to consider changes in:

Company culture

Environment

Social dynamics

Team hierarchy

An employee with this observation ability is always willing to learn and adapt to new challenges.

For instance, someone handling customer cancellations knows they must change their approach when working on a tech support line. This is simply because their callers’ needs differ, and they have different targets to hit, such as a daily volume of customers retained vs. call queues reduced by a certain amount.

2. Objectivity

Objective employees care about facts. They look beyond personal bias and emotions and treat everyone equally.

Being objective reduces unconscious bias and stops people from jumping to possibly harmful conclusions. They might ask themselves, Is this decision based on how I feel or on physical evidence?

An objective leader fairly reviews their team using the same scoring system.

Objectivity is an observation skill that helps to improve workplace inclusivity , boosting collaboration.

3. Adaptability

Adaptability is one of the most desirable observation power skills in recruits. Around 71% of executives claim it’s what they look for when hiring leaders.

That’s because it’s a powerful observational ability that helps people spot opportunities where they can help and quickly adjust their workloads to dive in.

For example, a cross-trained retail employee replenishing stock might notice a sales queue growing. However, there’s only one person on the register. An adaptable employee opens a new register to halve the queue and starts scanning items, reducing the co-worker's time and effort and keeping customers happy.

4. Attention to detail

Observant employees have a keen eye for noticing even the most minor details in their surroundings. They have situational awareness and quickly notice visual cues, body language, and slight changes to projects others might not have spotted.

Take the role of a proofreader. Proofreaders are great at spotting tiny details by carefully reading and analyzing text.

Likewise, attentive employees are:

Highly punctual

Well organized

Perseverant

They’re also creative thinkers, trying new ways to solve problems based on small details.

For instance, an engineer might spot a manufacturing flaw the first time they look at a new process, which, although unlikely to cause damage, could speed up processes if fixed.

Good memory skills help people learn from mistakes and become more adaptable. Retaining information helps people think critically about the challenges they face in the future.

They could ask themselves:

What did I do in this situation last time?

What worked well, and what could I improve on?

Who can I reach out to for help?

What haven’t we tried yet?

With accurate memory recall, it’s easier to experiment. Again, you’re looking at a highly creative thinker who can selectively pick out lessons they’ve learned and apply them to new experiments and circumstances.

Candidates with these skills adapt well to active learning on the job, for instance, through interactive tasks and games. Research shows active learners are more likely to retain information for longer than passive or “traditional” learners.

6. Critical thinking

Critical thinkers can easily spot the significance, relevance, and effects of any information they encounter.

Thinking critically is related to objectivity. It involves removing bias and emotion from decision-making and focusing on the facts.

Let’s say a client advisor becomes emotionally invested in a particular customer’s case and wants to take complete control. However, three other valuable customers are waiting for help with complaints from the same advisor and are at risk of canceling their contracts.

An emotional thinker might risk “leapfrogging” their preferred customer ahead of the rest, focusing all of their attention on them and dragging out the others’ cases.

A critical thinker knows the queue is organized that way for a reason. Moving someone ahead could damage the company’s reputation and their own.

So, they might address the invested customer’s concerns, advise a callback, and then attend to the other customers to make sure they’re heard and cared for.

Again, like adaptability, critical thinking is high on employers’ lists when hiring. Around 81% of employers consider the skill very important in new hires.

7. Communication

Strong communicators understand what other employees need, where projects are heading, and what actions to prioritize. They also use non-verbal cues, like facial expressions and eye contact, to decode messages.

Effective communication skills include active listening, meaning good communicators focus on the details of what others say, ask follow-up questions, and respond thoughtfully.

Moreover, observant people share thoughts and ideas clearly and concisely, describing what they have seen in a way that others can understand.

Let’s say a project manager gives status updates to different people and departments. That means they need to adjust their language so it’s easy to read and keep key messages front and center.

Research shows that 50% of business leaders feel high-quality communication boosts their brand reputation, and 33% believe they have made new deals.

Find a five-star communicator with skills tests

Use our talent assessments to assess candidates objectively and find top-notch communicators for your organization.

Learning how to develop observation skills is normally a long-term process. However, the following observation tests could help you become more focused faster .

We include a few ways you, as an HR professional, can help improve observation ability from afar.

If you work in HR, here’s the fun part.

We’ve compiled a list of five observation tests to help you spot eagle-eyed employees before hiring them. They don’t need years of experience to develop these skills either.

Here’s a quick summary of how to start testing real-world observation skills while hiring and training employees:

We dig into more detail below.

1. Critical Thinking Test

Critical thinkers are like Sherlock Holmes – perceptive, detail-oriented, and skilled at recognizing patterns .

TestGorilla’s Critical Thinking observation test helps you assess candidates' approaches to problems, evaluate evidence, and arrive at well-reasoned conclusions.

This test presents candidates with scenarios or questions where they can show:

Thoughtful analysis

Logical reasoning

The ability to distinguish relevant information from distractions

Here’s an example question where an applicant needs to apply logic:

The Critical Thinking test helps you gauge a candidate’s ability to think creatively and adapt to new information.

Why not look closer at preview questions from this test and try some for yourself?

2. Business Ethics Test

People with strong business ethics understand how their decisions affect others and the company's reputation.

Someone with a good ethical compass generally understands how to make judgment calls in difficult situations and consider specific, objective facts before making snap decisions.

Our Business Ethics and Compliance test helps you measure managerial candidates' ability to think objectively about decisions that impact reputation or could violate policy.

It’s a good way to spot applicants who can take themselves “out” of difficult scenarios and make decisions based on facts and business expectations.

3. Attention to Detail Test

Our Attention to Detail Textual test helps you assess candidates’ ability to notice and accurately perceive even the smallest details and learn more about their focus.

Along with the Attention to Detail Visual test , this assessment presents written passages, images, or data sets:

This test's results explore a candidate’s:

Attentiveness

Meticulousness

Overall observation skills

4. A personality test

One of the best ways to assess someone’s adaptability, emotional intelligence, and contextual awareness is to run psychometric testing .

In particular, we recommend the 16 Types test , designed to break down observational abilities and behavioral tendencies.

Based on Carl Jung’s research, this test helps you understand how candidates perceive and process information, make decisions, and interact with others.

This test and other psychometric psychology assessments help pinpoint observational skills by assessing attention to detail, the ability to notice patterns and awareness of surroundings.

Learn how to use personality tests in your hiring process

One of our friendly experts is on hand to demonstrate the benefits of using personality assessments, such as the 16 Types test, for recruiting skilled candidates.

5. A role-specific test

There’s no such thing as an “observation expert,” so while you test observation skills, we suggest you also test aptitude for the role you’re hiring for.

Say you’re looking for a Python developer. In that case, try our Python (coding): Entry-Level Algorithms test, which asks takers to write and execute test code.

Or, you could hire a skilled accountant with an exceptional eye for detail and numeracy skills. In this case, run our Accounts Receivable test and measure their ability to record accurate data and measure balances.

Adding a role-specific test alongside observation skill assessments helps you build a well-rounded picture of potential recruits, such as when hiring a facilitator.

It’s easy to start with a free forever account , where you can test observation skills with a five-step observation assessment.

Don’t just take our word for it. Running multiple tests in a single assessment plan helped our clients, such as Click&Boat, focus on specific skills , boosting its overall hire quality.

Try to think of roles or observation activities where observational skills aren’t on the mark. Tricky, right?

It’s all the more reason why, as a recruiter, you should test for them – and, as an applicant, you should develop them . Hiring managers want people who are more than just technically proficient. People with great observational skills are innovators, self-starters, and flexible communicators.

Thankfully, skills-based hiring makes it easy to spot a conscientious candidate in the crowd. You just need a good observation skills test provider.

The best way to get started as a recruiter is to sign up for a free forever plan with TestGorilla.

If you’d prefer a little guidance, book a 30-minute demo and see what our testing system is capable of.

Now that you understand the powers of observation at work and in daily life and know how to set up an observation assessment, let’s run through a few final commonly asked questions.

Why are good observation skills important?

People with observation as a skill set can spot errors, inconsistencies, or defects in products, processes, or services. Observant employees are more likely to identify potential safety hazards, security threats, or risky behaviors in the workplace. What’s more, observation skills give employees a broader perspective and a deeper understanding of their work environment. These skills let them make informed decisions, reducing the risk of costly mistakes or poor judgment.

What are the 4 types of observation assessment?

Participant observation (joining groups and observing others from within as a member)

Non-participant observation (observing others from afar without direct involvement)

Controlled observation (designing control groups and using templates to measure results)

Indirect observation (experimenting with real-time changes, such as natural growth)

What is observation ability in critical thinking skills?

Observation in critical thinking is one’s ability to spot minor details to help make more confident decisions. It sometimes appears as a separate term, critical observation, but the two go hand in hand when looking objectively at solving problems. Critical thinking is one aspect of observation we recommend testing for.

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