White Hat Explained: The Six Thinking Hats [Book Summary 2/7]
This is the 2nd part of the book summary series on the Six Thinking Hats.
The White Hat is all about facts and information. The white color stands for neutrality. Just the facts.
So it is concerned with questions such as:
- What information do we have?
- What information do we need?
- What information is missing?
- What questions do we need to ask?
- How are we going to get that information?
It’s all about seeking out the truth and not about generating ideas.
When do we use the White Hat?
We can use the White Hat both at the beginning or at the end of an evaluation or brainstorm session.
In the beginning, we can use it at the start of a session to make sure we have all the facts we need.
At the end of a session, we can use the White Hat to ask “Do our proposals fit in with the existing information?”
How to use the White Hat
You can role-play being a computer, or maybe being Wikipedia. It just gives the facts.
- Use your white hat with a certain focus.
“Give me your broad white hat thinking on unemployment”
“Now give me your white hat thinking on school-leavers six months after they have left school”
There is an unlimited amount of data out there, so it’s good to be quite focused when using the White Hat. Otherwise you’ll be overwhelmed won’t be able to see anything useful.
2. Make sure you get just the facts
“Because of health concerns, more and more people are becoming vegan”
→ Stop. White hat thinking: What are the facts?
“Well I got a study here, so it’s a fact.”
→ No, what you have is two separate facts.
- Product sales of alternative protein products have risen by 20% each of the past three years
- There is some market research that shows that people claim to become vegan out of health concerns
Checked Fact vs Unchecked Facts
A very important component of proper White Hat Thinking is the distinction between checked facts and unchecked or believed facts.
We can state unchecked facts, but must clearly mark them as such
“I think I am right in saying that vegans are the main reason behind alternative protein sales numbers increasing”
“I once read that Japanese executives have large expense accounts because they give most of their salaries to their wives”
De Bono talks about a two-tier system of checked facts vs. unchecked facts. It is critical to maintain that distinction very clearly whenever working with the White Hat.
Before making a decision on believed facts, we have to go and try to check them.
With the White Hat, you want to have the attitude of a scientist who carefully describes fauna and flora. He lays all the specimens on the table for careful study.
Of course it is important to form hypotheses. But your mere opinion on something should not be allowed here.
The tentative, hypothetical and provocative are critical for good thinking. It is just important to check it before we make a decision.
The key rule in White Hat Thinking is that nothing should be put forward on a ‘higher level’ than it actually is.
How to deal with likelihood
Since it’s not always possible to check all the facts, we need to develop the skill to deal with likelihood.
In his book Superforecasting, Philipp Tetlock recounts the remarkable difference in meaning people have attributed to the statement “There is a serious possibility that…”.
Some thought this meant a 20% likelihood, while others thought of it with more of an 80% likelihood. Clearly this language isn’t very useful as a basis for decision making!
Best is to use numbers and percentages to describe likelihood of a fact.
Short of using actual numbers (best), it’s skillful to use language that allows less room for interpretation, like the ones below.
Spectrum of likelihood from
- Always true
- Usually true
- Generally True
- By and large
- More often than not
- About half of the time
- Often true
- Sometimes true
- Occasionally true
- Been known to happen
- Never true
- Can’t be true (contradictory)
In fact, in his Principles series, Ray Dalio even invites us to be imprecise at times for conceptual thinking:
“Be imprecise. Understand the concept of “by-and-large” and use approximations. Because our educational system is hung up on precision, the art of being good at approximations is insufficiently valued. This impedes conceptual thinking.”
Clearly label anecdotes as such
“There is an anecdote about a man falling out of an airplane and surviving it”
“Sales will TEND to rise when prices are lowered” (With house prices, they may increase with rising prices are people are feeling FOMO)
Precision in making statements
Let’s look at the following three examples from the book to notice the degree of precision each of the statements has
- All the experts believe that the interest will fall by the end of the year
- I talked to four experts and they all think that the interest rates will fall by the end of the year
- I talked to Mr. Smith, Ms. Johnson, Ms. Ma and Mr. Warren, and they all believe the interest rates will fall by the end of the year.
Do you see how the subtle differences could potentially have a large impact on our decision making?
White Hat vs Red Hat
One of the main values of the Six Thinking Hat method is its focus on a deliberate thinking mode.
The Red Hat and the White Hat are a pair of opposite thinking modes. The White one only looks for facts, while the Red one allows for emotions (not backed up by facts) to be expressed.
White Hat:
“We reached 50 stores. Each store on average sold 450 products in the last 90 days. In a customer survey we ran with 300 people right after they left the store in Birmingham, they told us that they thought our price was too high. Two competitors are going for the same market.”
Red Hat:
“We have a shitty product that is overpriced. Our competition is way better at marketing and is eating away our market share.”
Summary of white hat
- Imagine being like a computer. White for Neutral. Just give facts.
- Clearly distinguish checked facts vs unchecked facts
- Use numbers to deal with likelihood
- Clearly label anecdotes as such
- Use precise language when making statements
Your Turn
When can you apply the White Hat next? When you make your next decision, can you lay out the probabilities of positive outcomes in numbers?
Next time we’ll dig into the Red Hat!
Subscribe below to get the article straight to your inbox.
Flavio Rump is an entrepreneur and investor. He shares decision-making models from the world’s best decision makers. You can read his articles, watch his YouTube Videos or join his free newsletter to learn how to make better decisions.
