Critical Thinking Memorandum

Critical Thinking Memorandum

Melissa Delfenthal

07/18/2016

PHL/320 BSGH1KTED7

Graciano Etrada

Critical Thinking Memorandum

Introduction

What is Critical Thinking?  Critical thinking is something that each of us does in our personal and professional lives.  The use of critical thinking is important to providing each of us a way to make rational decisions and come to a conclusion of an issue.  Critical thinking relates to decision making by assessing the issue at hand and coming up with the best decision that concludes the issue.  I would also state that using critical thinking is done with each decision that is made.  With each issue that we address, we use critical thinking, but some decisions are harder to make than others.  Sometimes, issues come our way and we need to make a decision quickly, and without all the facts, we can potentially make the wrong decisions.  Critical thinking is the process of gathering evidence and analyzing the information in an intellectual way rather than making a decision with emotions.  Critical thinking is a process that every person uses at one point and can help a person make a challenging decision.

Benefits and Importance of Critical Thinking

 Critical thinking has benefits that include understanding a problem and being able to stand up with your opinion on the issue.  Another benefit of critical thinking is being able to determine the credibility of a source.  This can help if the source is being used for research or supports your position on an issue.  Using critical thinking allows a person to be more decided, secure, and capable of reaching a decision.  Thinking efficiently and effectively can upgrade the way we express our findings.  In making sense of how to break down the right structure of works, essential thinking will also improve critical thinking skills.

Because critical thinking involves analyzing, evaluating, and monitoring the thinking process, critical thinking helps develop a deeper understanding of the problem.  Therefore the decision being made is more likely to be considered by others.  Another benefit of critical thinking is how it helps to build imagination.  The continuum of thinking critically allows us to become more creative in each issue or situation that comes our way.

Personal Experience

        As a supervisor and trainer, I was asked to cut down payroll budget by the way of a lay-off.  As in any situation like this, I felt that there had to be a way to decrease payroll amount without lay-offs.  So I figured out how much of the payroll budget I had to cut, analyzed on a spread sheet and camp up with an alternative plan.  The plan would be that if each employee would cut back their hours to 32 hours per week, they would still have their benefits as well as their jobs.  This plan helped me to bring my argument to our CFO and my director in a positive way and kept us for any lay-offs.  However, some of the employees did not like that they lost one day per week of pay but in the end were appreciative that they still had a job.