What is Thinking Pattern?
Thinking pattern is a person’s natural preference in responding to data or event. There are 3 types of thinking patterns: analytical thinking, system thinking, and conceptual thinking. Everyone will always have dominance in one of the above thinking patterns. The way a person works will tend to be colored by his dominant thinking pattern.
People who have dominance in analytical thinking patterns will tend to study data or events based on causal relationships, correlate one data/with other data/events, and look for a causal relationship pattern. Professions such as stock brokers, accountants, and investment officers require strong analytical thinking skills.
Data/events > finding a causal relationship > looking at the relationship pattern > creating a model for future prediction reference > using the model for each subsequent occurrence.
People who have the dominance in system thinking patterns will tend to study data or events based on process and sequence of events. They have the ability to describe the process imaginatively. Professions such as IT programmers, quality assurance, and auditors require strong system thinking skills.
Data/events > recognizing the occurrence of the data/events > identifying potential for inefficient or ineffective process > recommending process improvement
People who have the dominance in conceptual thinking patterns will tend to focus on the essence of data/events as a trigger to generate improvement ideas or produce a new work method/model that would produce better output. Professions such as business development, human resources development, and management development require strong conceptual thinking ability.
Data/events > understand the nature of the data/events > use the nature of the data/events as triggers > get the ideas of improvement or make the work model for better results.
Why need to know about Thinking Pattern?
Recognizing the strengths in the thinking pattern is the most important activity before deciding what profession to be lived or job role to be addressed. Choosing the path of the profession or handling a certain job role that is not supported with the capacity of the appropriate thinking pattern will lead to a mediocre achievement in that profession / job role. The impact is also on the reward aspects of the performance, both in terms of salary increases, bonuses, or promotional opportunities.
So What…
In the era of a tight competition with the spirit of faster-higher-better, you need to focus on strengthening your strength to win the competition. There are 4 things you must to do:
1. Identify the most dominant type of your thinking pattern. It is a big mistake if you feel can act as a superman, strong in all three types of the thinking patterns. The simplest science to win the competition is to beat your competitors in the area where you are most powerful.
2. Choose a career path or take a job role that requires your dominant thinking pattern. Do not choose a career or accept job role where the dominance of your thinking pattern is not much useful in that career path or job role. You will be able to maximize utilization of your potential when the job fits your strength.
3. Complement the dominance of your thinking pattern with strategic thinking ability so that your performance will always be above average and this will allow you to have the opportunity to enter the group of high potential people, and then, can be included in the cadre development program.
4. Learn more about the competence of strategic thinking so that you can understand how to maximize the development of your competencies and use it to achieve the success you desire.