Critical Thinkin in Decison Making

CRITICAL THINKING 1

Critical Thinking and Decision Making

By: Denise Nee

January 24, 2010

MGT/350 Critical Thinking Strategies in Decision Making

Professor: Gabriela Guzman

CRITICAL THINKING 2

Critical thinking is one subject in my life that will be an ongoing process to grow and perfect. When I apply critical thinking in my personal and professional lives, I gain intellectual growth and opportunity. This paper will be my best description of the complex combination of skills necessary for effective critical thinking and how I apply it to my daily personal and professional life.

“Critical thinking is reasonable reflective thinking focused on deciding what to believe or do” (R.H. Ennis 2003). Critical thinking allows individuals to have a subjective analysis of objective data, and to evaluate how well each analysis may meet their needs. Some of the skills necessary to accomplish effective critical thinking are rationality, self-awareness, honesty, open-mindedness, discipline, and judgments.

Rationality is import in critical thinking because individuals tend to rely on reason rather than emotion when making an important decision’s. Self awareness is necessary in this process because one should recognize their own assumptions, prejudices, biases, or points of views. Honesty is acknowledging and recognizing individual emotional impulses, self motives, or others modes of self-deception, in the critical thinking process.

In my experiences acquiring an open mind is one of the key...