Six thinking hats for software testers

Blue hat topic peace making is a mandatory subject at all schools around the world. In this era of increased speedtomarket where focus is more on lean and agile, exploratory testing has become more significant than ever. Red hat thinkers tend to use hunches, gut feel, intuition and previous experience. Our testing is only as good as our thinkingand all too often we are hampered by limiting ideas, poor communication, and preset roles and responsibilities. This forces you to move outside your habitual thinking style, and helps you to get a more rounded view of a situation. Below is a general overview of the different roles, purpose, and goals behind each hat. The six thinking hats concept aims to minimize the confusion in thinking that arises because of the way the human brain usually thinkstaking into consideration emotions, facts, creativity, hope, and logic all at once. Construct the six different colored hats out of large pieces of construction paper. How to use the six thinking hats technique lucidchart blog. How to solve problems using the six thinking hats method. What you have a skillful blue hat orchestrating things, the result is a meeting where collaboration underscores everything and better decisions are made. Testers commonly face challenges around onedimensional thinking, limited ideas, and communication issues.

Each hat has a different purpose and there is a meta hat which. Six thinking hats for software testers julian harty starwest duration. Explicit questions are provided for each of the six thinking hats, to support students to think deeply about the text, the lorax by dr seuss. The 6 thinking hats of software quality assurance testing testuff. The model is considered as the underlying theory of critical thinking. A comprehensive database of six thinking hats quizzes online, test your knowledge with six thinking hats quiz questions. They are different thinking modes that everyone should be able to put on and take off depending on what thinking is needed. It serves as a teambased problem solving and brainstorming technique that can be used to explore problems and solutions and uncover ideas and options that might otherwise be overlooked by a homogeneously thinking group. Applying six thinking hats to lets test conference flow of. Agenda define parallel thinking identify each of the six hats apply six hats method to problem solving 2. Six thinking hats ihi institute for healthcare improvement. Jun 24, 2019 the six hats thinking method enables teams to think deeply about problems without offending anyone personally.

Six thinking hats programs, courses aiu students in. Reduce meeting length to one quarter of what they were previously make decisions in just 15 minutes, rather than 3 hours. Six thinking hats and the associated idea parallel thinking provide a means for groups to plan thinking processes in a detailed and cohesive way, and in doing so to think together more effectively in 2005, the tool found some use in the united kingdom innovation sector, where it was offered by some facilitation companies and. Optimistic judgmental creative emotional directiongiving factual. On each of the hats, choose a word that describes the types of questions each hat focuses on. To keep the group focused on providing feedback based on different views of the same situation minus the conflicts, im using a methodology created by edward debono called six thinking hats. However, avoid the temptation of tinkering at this stage. May 10, 20 the title of the talk is six thinking hats for software testers and you can watch it here.

Oct 01, 2008 julian harty, one of our senior test engineers, is presenting a keynote at the starwest conference today wednesday, october 1 on six thinking hats for software testers. The six thinking hats technique for problem solving. Realistically, that situation is quite similar to method acting, where actors create in themselves the thoughts and feelings of their characters to develop lifelike performances. Browse the amazon editors picks for the best books of 2019, featuring our. Wikipedia describes the underlying principle like this. These types of thinking are about innovation and exploration, not ego and opinion. As with actual hats, each of the six thinking hats will not suit everyone. How to use the six thinking hats method for problem solving.

But in project management circles, wearing the black hat can be a good thing. Six thinking hats overview click for an editable template what is the six thinking hats technique. Session 6 six thinking hats six thinking hats is an important and powerful technique. The 6 thinking hats of software testing 8 key takeaway most software testers feel right at home wearing the white hat. Eight years on, these have remained useful and valuable for many people involved in software testing. It forces you to move outside your norm, and helps you to consider things from multiple perspectives. Anuj magazine looks at how this concept can help with user experience testing.

Online library of quality, service improvement and. Hats help a group to use parallel thinking color of hat identifies the type or direction of thinking the main idea is to have the group wear only one hat at a time introduction to six thinking hats. Six thinking hats is a critical thinking tool that helps you look at a decision from different points of view. Students work in small cooperative groups to discuss ke. Planit the six thinking hats of exploratory testing. I have a good feeling about it, im sure it will work because ive seen it work for other businesses. The six thinking hats is a lateral thinking tool designed to provide structure to the thinking of an individual or a group. Each hat has a different purpose and there is a meta hat which drives. Therefore, if youre currently struggling with an array of problems, then the six thinking hats method can become an excellent source of inspiration.

Some of these practice questions will deal with the roles associated with different hats. Used to huge success by big companies and organisations such as ibm, siemens and nasa, the six hats method is a proven way to. The 6 thinking hats of software quality assurance testing published on october 6, 2015 october 6, 2015 28 likes 3 comments. This particular interpretation of the six thinking hats is specifically targeted toward individuals who deal with daily challenges in their business, career, and life. Six thinking hats is a brainstorming technique which is used to incorporate parallel thinking. Groups of people can roleplay with the six thinking hats using case studies and examples in the book. Remember you do not have to use the hat metaphor if you think it may get in the way.

How six thinking hats can help with user experience testing. Six thinking hats for software testers stickyminds. The colours are white for facts and figures red for emotions and feelings black for negative. And although we generally encourage starting with the blue hat, there.

His work is now widely used in education and business. The hats are not different roles to be assigned to people. The title of the talk is six thinking hats for software testers and you can watch it here. Six thinking hats for improved brainstorming and collaboration. Six thinking hats and the associated idea parallel thinking provide a means for groups to plan thinking processes in a detailed and cohesive way, and in doing so to think together more effectively. With six hats thinking, you adopt a parallel thinking process that examines an issue from different angles. Parallel thinking is a practice in which the focus of all participants at any given time is in the same direction. This approach for using six thinking hats is lightweight and lowoverhead, but gets you 80% there without requiring everybody to know the details of the six thinking hats. I had been sporadically using this concept in my daytoday life. Six thinking hats theory and how to apply it to problem. The key is to list questions that everybody can focus on and cycle through. The timer can ask for any of the six thinking hats. It forces you to move outside your habitual thinking style, and to look at things from a number of different perspectives.

Among tens of videos ive listened, one has rose above others. Applying the six thinking hats exercise 0 group discussion exercise. The theory offers an ever more effective and cohesive solution for both group discussions and individual thinking process. The six thinking hats is a parallel thinking methodology so all individuals in a discussion all wear the same hat at the same time. In the book he talks about promoting multidimensional thinking by mapping different colors to different cognitive styles. Parallel thinking guides thought processes in one direction at a time so we can effectively analyze issues, generate new ideas, and make better decisions. Using 6 thinking hats for better design thoughtworks. Oct 04, 2009 i had written about six thinking hats and its association with software testing a while back.

Listen in to learn how you can apply them to your work, and escape from your testing rut. When it comes to search engine optimization seo and network security, the term black hat has very negative often illegal connotations. The six thinking hats of exploratory testing planit. Applying six thinking hats to lets test conference flow of testing. How to use the six thinking hats for uxexploratory testing. Jul 25, 2016 in 2008 julian gave a popular keynote titled six thinking hats at the starwest conference, detailing ways testers could usefully improve their testing practices by applying various concepts and ideas to how they work. After a few minutes, swap hats and continue the discussion with the new thinking styles. Six thinking hats tips some groups can be put off by the concept of the hats, but you can still get them to use parallel thinking by just asking them to consider all the positives, negatives, data needs, etc. Oct 16, 20 while there are pros and cons to using six thinking hats for user testing, one aspect that can help testers is to become better at role playing different users. May 08, 2018 the thinking has been segregated into six categories, hence the six thinking hats and each hat has been given a colour.

Each of the six hats has a color representing a direction of thinkingthe blue hat provides the overview and helps to keep us productive, the white hat helps us to collect facts, the red is a way to express intuition and feelings without having to justify them, the yellow hat seeks the best possible outcome, the black hat helps us to discover what might go wrongnot only with the software but also with our tests and our assumptions. Six hats on software testing other testing test huddle. An online course which serves as a supplement to your facetoface training in six thinking hats, the new thinking leader or the course in creativity cost. Six thinking hats six thinking hats is a strategy that teaches students be flexible thinkers. Applying six thinking hats to lets test conference flow. The 6 thinking hats of software testing download testuff. Our testing is only as good as our thinkingand all too often we are hampered by limiting ideas, poor communication, and preset roles and. The 6th technique is designed to help individuals deliberately adopt a variety of perspectives. Students learn about six different types of thinking they can apply to any situation, represented by different colored hats.

Independent software testing consultant this webinar presents the concepts of six thinking hats, and demonstrates how they have been applied to software testing. The title of the talk is six thinking hats for software testers and you can watch it. Six thinking hats online an online course which serves as a supplement to your facetoface training in six thinking hats, the new thinking leader or the course in creativity cost. Seeing things in various ways is often a good idea in strategy formation or complex decisionmaking processes. Six thinking hats is a parallel thinking technique which steers ones thought process in a detailed and cohesive manner. Feb 26, 2020 six thinking hats for software testers julian harty starwest duration.

Posted by jessica tomechak, test engineering team julian harty, one of our senior test engineers, is presenting a keynote at the starwest conference today wednesday, october 1 on six thinking hats for software testers. That video is julian hartys talk from starwest 2008. How to use the six thinking hats to improve your thinking. And whether consciously or not, most of us automatically take stock of what we know before jumping into any big project. Each hat has a different color that represents a specific mindset. The 6 thinking hats of software quality assurance testing. According to this new philosophy, it is possible to fuse the best components of many different cognitive styles to achieve optimal results in project management. In my quest to further explore its usage, i gave a shot to use this amazing concept for creative writing. The 6 thinking hats do not just apply to problem solving. This webinar presents the concepts of six thinking hats, and demonstrates how they have been applied to software testing. For example, the white hat calls for information known or needed, so facts is a good word to place on the white hat. Improv and discussion exercises for testers slideshare.

This will be a hands on workshop, working in small groups to learn and apply the basic concepts behind the 6 thinking hats to software testing. Putting on a different thinking cap can help you innovate solutions in a whole new way. Consider offering a brief presentation or short prereading on the nature of parallel thinking. If you are wondering about where he got the idea for hats, it comes from the phrase, put on your thinking cap.

There are six different color imaginary hats that you can put on or take off. This work has been presented, developed, and refined over the last 5 years. Sometimes, all you need to break out of a comfort zone or come up with better approaches is a fresh perspective. Our online six thinking hats trivia quizzes can be adapted to suit your requirements for taking some of the top six thinking hats quizzes.