Though impacted by the serious Covid-19 Pandemic,  Sohu.com with de Bono China’s Master Trainer, Joanna WANG, delivered on schedule an in-house workshop on October 18, 2022. A total of 30 individual contributors were fully engaged in learning and using the Six Thinking Hats.

To put thinking into action, we followed up a 7-day boot camp using the Sohu Thinking Experiment Mini-Program. Thirty members logged on each day, sharing cases, providing feedback or exchanging encouraging remarks and emojis.

Participants exhibited tremendous enthusiasm to practice what they had learned, either on individual use or group parallel thinking. The team submitted 30 case studies and demonstrated exceptional results.

The outcomes

In our post-interviews, all participants reported that they have witnessed the simplicity, practicality, and power of the Six Thinking Hats. 98.7 percent confirmed that the efficiency and effectiveness in their meetings (group members ranging from 4 to 13) have been radically improved, even when they were leading mixed groups that some knew the Hats and some didn’t.

In addition, the in-house workshop, the follow-up boot camp, and the collection of cases for actual application made this learning immediately useful.

The actions

The head of the company highly commended de Bono’s systematic thinking methodology and wrote  a thank-you letter: “Thanks to the diligent and careful arrangement of such an inspiring workshop from the HR team, all our members who joined it reported very positively on the Six Thinking Hats. I often heard them discussing their takeaways and spotted the changes in their mindset. It has been greatly empowering our thinking ability and fostered friendship among us. This will in turn create a positive culture for constructive communication and collaboration.”

Sohu.com has shown an enthusiastic approach to designing the future using the collaborative approach of Parallel Thinking. They are looking forward to using Dr de Bono’s methods with the support of de Bono Beijing to further strengthen organizational communication, to reduce conflict, to improve employee engagement, and to increase productivity. Sohu.com has also expressed a deep commitment to nurturing a culture of collaboration, on creating a culture where ideas are welcomed and developed in a cooperative manner.