Post by John Uliano on Feb 10, 2021 15:12:16 GMT
While the assigned materials offer several pitfalls to critical thinking, I identify with the following barriers most strongly:
1) I do not give enough time to the critical thinking process.
Critical thinking is not done quickly, it is careful and deliberate. While I do not feel that I am ever reckless in my critical thinking/decision making process, I certainly am one to try to get to an answer quickly, so that I can “check off” the issue from my list and move on to the next item to address.
2) I can be too susceptible to inherited opinions and intuition.
While there is certainly a place for intuition and “trusting your gut” in situations that are familiar and have an expected outcome, often I rely on doing a task because it is the way I, or my department, has always done it, and do not further analyze whether the way I am doing something is the most efficient way to do it or if it provides the best outcome. I get a bit lazy in a sense. Also, this plays a bit into my first point, as I do not have to spend much time thinking through a process if I think I already know the answer and have something I can apply to the issue at hand.
3) Relying too heavily on emotion, at the expense of reason/logic.
Like intuition, I do believe that the use of our emotions in our work, and emotional intelligence, is of immense value. For me, the way I often feel about the work I am doing serves to fuel my passion. I do struggle though with focusing my emotions and emotional energy when faced with challenging or frustrating situations, especially those that could call into question my performance or suggest that I am not addressing an issue properly. In those instances, I have a hard time regulating my emotions, and I become reactive and easily overwhelmed, and any attempt to think critically is lost.
In a prior position, I was overseeing a housing program that was to be audited by its funder, which had yet to occur in its 10+ years of operation. The audit was to focus on client charts, and while our processes at the present time were in place to meet many of the documentation requirements of the funder, I knew we were missing some needed pieces and I was concerned about the lack of documentation from the years prior to my arrival to the program. I became overly worried about how the outcome of the audit could potentially reflect on my management of the program and this paralyzed my thinking. Had I been more disciplined in my process of addressing the audit, and if I thought more critically about the documentation needs that required attention, doing my best to leave my emotions out of it, I likely could have developed and put into action an organized plan to meet those needs. Instead, I struggled with controlling my emotional energy, reacted too abruptly and at first failed to focus on all that was missing from the client charts. I also overlooked using my team for support or seeking their advice on how to best address the challenges of the audit. I did not attempt to problem solve, as I thought it was my sole responsibility to identify a solution so that we would pass the audit. Because I did not take the time consider the best course to plan for the audit, and I got stuck in my worries about its eventual outcome, my organization at the time had to bring in another director to assist with the audit preparation, which in hindsight was the best decision, although a bit of a blow to my ego.
1) I do not give enough time to the critical thinking process.
Critical thinking is not done quickly, it is careful and deliberate. While I do not feel that I am ever reckless in my critical thinking/decision making process, I certainly am one to try to get to an answer quickly, so that I can “check off” the issue from my list and move on to the next item to address.
2) I can be too susceptible to inherited opinions and intuition.
While there is certainly a place for intuition and “trusting your gut” in situations that are familiar and have an expected outcome, often I rely on doing a task because it is the way I, or my department, has always done it, and do not further analyze whether the way I am doing something is the most efficient way to do it or if it provides the best outcome. I get a bit lazy in a sense. Also, this plays a bit into my first point, as I do not have to spend much time thinking through a process if I think I already know the answer and have something I can apply to the issue at hand.
3) Relying too heavily on emotion, at the expense of reason/logic.
Like intuition, I do believe that the use of our emotions in our work, and emotional intelligence, is of immense value. For me, the way I often feel about the work I am doing serves to fuel my passion. I do struggle though with focusing my emotions and emotional energy when faced with challenging or frustrating situations, especially those that could call into question my performance or suggest that I am not addressing an issue properly. In those instances, I have a hard time regulating my emotions, and I become reactive and easily overwhelmed, and any attempt to think critically is lost.
In a prior position, I was overseeing a housing program that was to be audited by its funder, which had yet to occur in its 10+ years of operation. The audit was to focus on client charts, and while our processes at the present time were in place to meet many of the documentation requirements of the funder, I knew we were missing some needed pieces and I was concerned about the lack of documentation from the years prior to my arrival to the program. I became overly worried about how the outcome of the audit could potentially reflect on my management of the program and this paralyzed my thinking. Had I been more disciplined in my process of addressing the audit, and if I thought more critically about the documentation needs that required attention, doing my best to leave my emotions out of it, I likely could have developed and put into action an organized plan to meet those needs. Instead, I struggled with controlling my emotional energy, reacted too abruptly and at first failed to focus on all that was missing from the client charts. I also overlooked using my team for support or seeking their advice on how to best address the challenges of the audit. I did not attempt to problem solve, as I thought it was my sole responsibility to identify a solution so that we would pass the audit. Because I did not take the time consider the best course to plan for the audit, and I got stuck in my worries about its eventual outcome, my organization at the time had to bring in another director to assist with the audit preparation, which in hindsight was the best decision, although a bit of a blow to my ego.