Critical Thinking and Innovation Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Senior Managers, Department Heads and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-IC-010

Before you join: Participants should have experience contributing to decisions, projects, service improvement or change initiatives.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Leaders are expected to improve services, solve persistent operational problems and make sound decisions when evidence is incomplete, opinions conflict and resources are constrained. Yet many teams move too quickly from a stated problem to a familiar solution, confuse assumptions with facts, or generate ideas without a clear route to testing and implementation. This course addresses the disciplined thinking and creative methods needed to turn ambiguous business issues into defensible decisions and practical innovation proposals.

Participants learn to frame problems precisely, test claims, identify cognitive bias, examine evidence quality and challenge assumptions constructively. They use systems thinking to identify causes and consequences, then apply structured creativity methods including SCAMPER, Six Thinking Hats, TRIZ and design thinking. The course connects divergent idea generation with convergent evaluation, enabling participants to select ideas against customer value, feasibility, risk and organisational fit.

Instructor-led sessions combine short briefings with cases drawn from public services, banking, infrastructure, technology and multinational operations. Participants work individually and in groups on realistic decisions, service improvements and innovation challenges, using facilitated critique and decision simulations. Each participant leaves with a problem-framing brief, evidence assessment, stakeholder map, idea portfolio, innovation experiment plan and personal application plan for a current workplace challenge.

The course suits managers, specialists, project leaders and advisers who must influence decisions, improve processes or develop new products, services and policies. It is particularly useful for professionals whose work requires both analytical discipline and practical originality rather than unstructured brainstorming alone.

What you will be able to do

  • Frame ambiguous business problems using problem statements, issue trees and stakeholder needs
  • Assess evidence quality using source tests, assumption mapping and logical argument structures
  • Identify cognitive biases and apply debiasing techniques during individual and group decisions
  • Generate solution options using SCAMPER, Six Thinking Hats and TRIZ principles
  • Analyse root causes and system effects using causal loop diagrams and the Five Whys
  • Evaluate innovation ideas using desirability, feasibility, viability and risk criteria
  • Design low-cost experiments using hypotheses, measures, prototypes and learning reviews
  • Present an evidence-based innovation recommendation with implementation priorities and decision criteria

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Make recommendations that distinguish evidence, assumptions, risks and opinions
  • Lead idea sessions without relying on unstructured brainstorming
  • Challenge senior and peer viewpoints constructively using clear reasoning
  • Turn persistent workplace problems into testable innovation opportunities
  • Build a personal reputation for sound judgement and practical originality

For your organisation

  • Improve decision quality by making assumptions and evidence gaps visible
  • Reduce wasted effort on solutions that address symptoms rather than causes
  • Create more viable improvement ideas from cross-functional teams
  • Test service and process changes before committing major resources
  • Establish a repeatable method for evaluating innovation proposals

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can distinguish sound reasoning from unsupported claims in workplace decisions.

  • Critical thinking standards: clarity, accuracy, relevance, logic, breadth and fairness
  • Claims, reasons and evidence separated within management recommendations
  • Deductive and inductive reasoning applied to operational decisions
  • Argument maps exposing premises, conclusions and missing logical links
  • Fact, inference and opinion distinguished in executive reports
  • Intellectual humility and constructive challenge during leadership discussions

Participants can define decision problems that focus inquiry and prevent premature solutions.

  • Problem statements separating symptoms, causes, constraints and desired outcomes
  • Issue trees breaking complex questions into mutually exclusive branches
  • Five Whys used without oversimplifying multi-cause organisational problems
  • Stakeholder needs translated into decision questions and success criteria
  • How might we questions opening productive solution exploration
  • Scope boundaries preventing problem statements from becoming unmanageable

Participants can assess evidence quality and reduce predictable errors in judgement.

  • CRAAP test assessing currency, relevance, authority, accuracy and purpose
  • Assumption mapping by certainty and impact on proposed decisions
  • Confirmation bias, anchoring and availability bias in management judgement
  • Premortem analysis identifying reasons a proposed decision could fail
  • Base rates and reference classes challenging intuitive probability estimates
  • Triangulation across quantitative data, qualitative insight and operational records

Participants can analyse interconnected causes, feedback effects and unintended consequences.

  • Causal loop diagrams mapping reinforcing and balancing feedback relationships
  • Fishbone diagrams structuring people, process, technology and policy causes
  • Systems boundaries defining relevant actors, dependencies and external influences
  • Stock and flow thinking clarifying backlogs, capacity and service demand
  • Second-order consequences tested before selecting an intervention
  • Root cause hypotheses validated against available operational evidence

Participants can generate varied solution options through structured creative techniques.

  • Divergent and convergent thinking separated during idea development
  • SCAMPER prompts producing modifications to services, processes and products
  • Six Thinking Hats sequencing facts, risks, benefits and creative alternatives
  • Analogical thinking transferring solutions from unrelated industries and contexts
  • Forced connections combining customer needs with available organisational assets
  • Idea quotas preventing early judgement from limiting option generation

Participants can use TRIZ principles to resolve conflicting requirements creatively.

  • Technical and business contradictions stated as competing improvement requirements
  • TRIZ ideality defining beneficial results with minimal cost and harm
  • Forty Inventive Principles generating alternatives for recurring contradictions
  • Segmentation, inversion and merging applied to service design problems
  • Resources analysis identifying unused time, data, skills and capacity
  • Contradiction resolution avoiding compromise solutions where possible

Participants can develop ideas from validated user needs and service journeys.

  • Design thinking stages: empathise, define, ideate, prototype and test
  • Persona profiles distinguishing user goals, behaviours, barriers and contexts
  • Customer journey maps locating friction, delays and unmet needs
  • Jobs to Be Done statements identifying functional and emotional outcomes
  • Observation questions separating reported preferences from actual behaviours
  • Opportunity statements linking user pain points to organisational priorities

Participants can compare ideas objectively and develop a justified innovation proposal.

  • Desirability, feasibility and viability criteria scoring proposed innovation concepts
  • Impact-effort matrix prioritising ideas for further development
  • Weighted decision matrices making trade-offs explicit and reviewable
  • Risk registers identifying operational, financial, legal and adoption concerns
  • Value proposition canvases connecting customer gains, pains and solution features
  • Portfolio balance between incremental improvements and higher-uncertainty opportunities

Participants can design proportionate tests that produce useful innovation evidence.

  • Testable hypotheses linking proposed changes to measurable expected outcomes
  • Minimum viable prototypes selected for service, process and product concepts
  • Experiment canvases specifying users, methods, measures and decision thresholds
  • Leading and lagging indicators chosen for innovation learning
  • A/B tests and pilot comparisons matched to practical constraints
  • After-action reviews converting test results into next-step decisions

Participants can communicate a reasoned proposal and plan its first implementation steps.

  • Pyramid Principle structuring recommendations for senior decision makers
  • Evidence-based narratives linking problem, insight, option and requested decision
  • Stakeholder mapping identifying sponsors, critics, users and implementation owners
  • RAPID decision roles clarifying recommend, agree, perform, input and decide
  • Implementation roadmaps sequencing experiments, approvals, resources and review points
  • Personal application plans specifying one workplace challenge and first actions

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Problem-framing brief template
  2. Evidence and assumption assessment checklist
  3. Causal loop diagram model
  4. Structured idea-generation toolkit
  5. Innovation experiment canvas
  6. Personal innovation application plan

Who should attend

  • Senior Managers — make consequential decisions amid competing evidence, priorities and stakeholder interests
  • Department Heads — improve services, processes and team decision quality
  • Project Managers — resolve uncertainty, challenge assumptions and develop workable options
  • Policy and Strategy Advisers — build defensible recommendations from incomplete or contested evidence
  • Product and Service Managers — convert customer needs into tested improvement concepts
  • Innovation and Change Leads — structure idea development, selection and implementation planning

Skills and tools covered

Critical reasoningCreative problem solvingEvidence evaluationSystems thinkingInnovation experimentationDecision facilitation

Tools and standards

SCAMPER, Six Thinking Hats, TRIZ, Design Thinking

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce reasoning, creativity and innovation methods, followed by facilitated case work and group analysis. Participants assess evidence, surface assumptions, diagnose root causes and generate options for realistic organisational scenarios. Simulations require teams to make decisions under uncertainty and defend recommendations against challenge. Structured peer critique improves the quality of problem statements, ideas and experiments. Individual application planning connects each method to a current workplace issue and identifies the first actions after the course.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have experience contributing to decisions, projects, service improvement or change initiatives. Familiarity with their organisation's priorities, customers, operational processes or policy context will help them apply the methods to realistic issues. They should be comfortable discussing evidence, assumptions and alternative viewpoints in a professional setting. No prior study of innovation, formal logic, design thinking, statistics, finance or specialist creative techniques is required. Participants do not need to bring a fully developed innovation proposal, although a current workplace problem is useful.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You need experience of workplace decisions, projects, service improvement or change work. No formal training in innovation, logic, design thinking, statistics or creative methods is required.

Bring details of a current problem, decision or improvement opportunity if you can. You will be able to apply the tools to course cases if your work issue is confidential or not yet defined.

It is designed for managers, project leaders, advisers, product managers and change professionals. It suits people who need to improve decisions while also producing credible new options.

The course gives equal attention to critical reasoning, evidence assessment, bias and systems analysis. It then uses creativity and design methods to produce options that can be tested and defended.

You can use the problem-framing, assumption mapping and idea-selection tools in team meetings, project reviews and business cases. The experiment canvas supports small tests before requesting wider investment.

Training runs from 08:30 to 16:30 each day, with about 6.5 contact hours daily. Time is divided among instructor input, case analysis, group work, decision simulations, peer critique and application planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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