Beyond Critical Thinking: The Need For A Humanistic Approach To Competence

Supriyo Chaudhuri, Founder & CEO - e1133.   'Critical thinking' is a cliché: Employers demand it in candidates ever so often, and universities claim to develop it in their students. However, despite featuring at the very top of every list of priorities, there is no agreement on what it really means. Employers' complaints and universities' claims have become louder, but they are talking about two different things. When I ask employers what they mean by critical thinking, they usually talk about 'first principles' thinking, the candidate's ability to break down a problem to its parts, analyse the issues and think of solutions ground up. The business goals are a given - shareholder value must be maximised, profits should be made, market share needs to be gained, etc. - and the employee needs to think within those boundaries and achieve the goals. For example, the employee is not expected to start by asking why or whether one should maximise shareholder value. That would be classi...