Six Thinking Hats: Facilitate Different Perspectives Without Forcing Consensus
The Six Thinking Hats method was developed by Edward de Bono. It uses a simple discussion rule: for a set period, participants examine a question through the same perspective, then change perspective together. “Six Thinking Hats” and “de Bono” are protected trademarks; this article is documentary and is neither training nor accreditation in the method (official trademark information). The method does not sort people into colored personality types. It organizes the group’s attention.
That distinction matters. A workshop can generate plenty of talk without supporting a decision. A useful sequence separates facts, risks, benefits, alternatives, and the eventual choice. It does not turn disagreement into artificial agreement, and it guarantees neither creativity nor decision quality.
A shared perspective, not six kinds of people
The method usually links six colors to six functions:
- white gathers available facts, missing information, and verification questions;
- red makes room for feelings, intuitions, and reactions without requiring an immediate explanation;
- black examines risks, constraints, and undesirable consequences;
- yellow looks for possible benefits and the conditions that would make them valuable;
- green opens alternatives, variations, and new ideas;
- blue organizes the process, its steps, and the decision to be made.
The group does not ask one person to be “the black hat” for the whole meeting. Everyone uses the same perspective at the same time. The de Bono Group’s official description presents the six functions as parallel thinking: information, benefits, risks, feelings, alternatives, and process control. A public French innovation guide describes a collective sequence with blue framing at the beginning and end, short rounds, and grouping before prioritization. The NHS Institute handbook also places Six Thinking Hats among creative-thinking tools. These are facilitation references, not evidence that the method fits every decision.
Before the workshop, write the expected decision in one sentence: “Should we test this option, modify it, or stop it?” A question that is too broad invites opinions that cannot be connected to a next step. A precise enough question still leaves room for several answers.
Collect material before bringing everyone together
The first risk is starting the meeting with a blank page. The first speaker then supplies the vocabulary, the problem, and sometimes the solution. Later participants respond to that frame instead of describing their own experience.
Start with a short individual collection. Ask each participant:
- what they know directly and what they do not know;
- what makes them expect success or risk;
- which alternative they want to examine;
- which question must be checked before deciding.
Open-ended questions fit this stage because they reveal situations, exceptions, and wording the facilitator did not anticipate. They do not establish that a story is true. Preserve its source, context, and status.
An actionable questionnaire helps connect collection to a real decision. Do not ask the workshop to solve a question that has no owner, scope, or next step.
A 60-to-90-minute protocol
The following outline can be adapted. Its timings are not a standard; they make the time spent on each operation visible.
1. Blue: frame the decision, 5 to 10 minutes
Restate the decision, the people affected, the available information, and the rule for disagreement. Separate what will be decided today from what must be checked later. Say that minority ideas will be kept.
2. White: establish the ground, 10 minutes
List facts, sources, and unknowns. Use careful wording: “three participants described…” rather than “users think…”. Note absent groups, inaccessible data, and contradictions. Repetition does not automatically make a claim verified.
3. Red: surface reactions, 5 minutes
Give each person a short turn without debate. Someone may say that an option worries them or seems promising without immediately proving it. The facilitator records the reaction and asks only whether it should become a question to examine. It is not used as a psychological measure.
4. Black: test risks, 10 minutes
Look for failure conditions: a missed dependency, an excluded audience, an unplanned cost, an irreversible choice, or an unwanted effect. Attach each risk to an observation, hypothesis, or question. A list of fears is not a probability analysis.
5. Yellow: clarify value, 10 minutes
Examine what each option could make possible, for whom, and under which conditions. Avoid vague benefits such as “a better experience.” Ask which observable sign would indicate the benefit, without promising that it will occur.
6. Green: open alternatives, 10 to 15 minutes
Produce variations, combinations, and stop options. Criticism waits for the next phase. An idea may remain incomplete; record its initial wording before clarifying it. People who do not want to speak can contribute in writing.
7. Blue: group and choose the next step, 10 to 20 minutes
Group proposals without erasing disagreements. Then define explicit criteria: expected value, feasibility, risk, reversibility, time to verification, or compatibility with a constraint. Choose an option, an experiment, or a follow-up question. If no decision is ready, say so and assign the required verification.
Commented example: choosing a follow-up after a survey
Invented example: a training team sees that participants complete a module but do not use the tool introduced. The team is considering a video, a shorter module, or brief support.
Under white, the group records that completion comes from the learning system, while later use is only described in six open answers. These are different sources. Under red, several trainers say they fear “losing” their time; the reaction is kept as a signal to clarify, not as evidence of a general refusal.
Under black, the team identifies the risk of adding a video that nobody watches. Under yellow, it sees that short support might help people who already tried the tool. Under green, it proposes three variations: a five-minute demonstration, a guided exercise, and an optional office hour.
The final blue round does not vote for the most popular idea. It chooses a reversible experiment: offer the guided exercise to the next group, ask what blocked use, and compare described use with the previous group. Rejected ideas remain in the record with the reason for the decision.
What to keep in the record
A useful record links each decision to the material that produced it:
| Element | Expected trace |
|---|---|
| Decision | Wording, scope, and owner |
| Contribution | Author or anonymity rule, original wording |
| Perspective | Color and production stage |
| Source | Answer, observation, document, or hypothesis |
| Disagreement | What differs and why |
| Criterion | Rule used to group or choose |
| Next step | Test, question, owner, and expected observation |
Groups are proposed readings. They must not erase a minority idea or turn a red intuition into a white fact. Human judgment is still required to assess context.
Where Harmate can help
If participants submit ideas separately before the workshop, Harmate can collect open-ended responses for the group to consider during divergence. It does not provide a native Six Thinking Hats workshop, facilitate the meeting, or choose the winning option. The team remains responsible for the sequence, rules, and decision.
Six Thinking Hats is useful when a group needs to change perspective deliberately. It becomes decorative when colors label people, a vote replaces criteria, or the synthesis erases evidence. Use the method to distribute attention more fairly, then return to the simple question: what can we decide, and what do we still need to verify?
