Good thinking, good products

When I started my career as a banker in the early 2000s, there were two messages that young professionals heard repeatedly. The first was: “In banking, we deal with financial instruments, not emotions.” The second was even more memorable: “We don’t pay you to think; we pay you to follow procedures.”

Yet something curious happened as people progressed through their careers. The same organisations that discouraged independent thinking at the entry level suddenly expected managers and leaders to demonstrate judgement, creativity, emotional intelligence, problem-solving ability, and strategic thinking. They were now expected to navigate complex customer relationships, resolve interpersonal conflicts, make difficult decisions, and contribute ideas that would improve products, processes, and performance.

Looking back, I often wonder where those capabilities were supposed to come from. If we spend years teaching people what to think and how to comply, why are we surprised when they struggle to think for themselves? In many ways, I suspect the culture has not changed much. Listen to some customer interactions today, and you will still encounter account officers and relationship managers who sound remarkably robotic – excellent at reciting procedures but less comfortable exercising judgement, empathy, and independent thought.

The distinction matters because the quality of an organisation’s products, services, strategies, customer experiences, and decisions rarely exceeds the quality of its thinking. Good thinking produces good decisions. Good decisions produce good products.

Research has long supported this idea. Psychologist Diane Halpern defines critical thinking as purposeful, reasoned, and goal-directed thinking, and her work demonstrates that thinking skills can be deliberately taught and improved. Daniel Kahneman’s groundbreaking research on judgement and decision-making showed how easily human beings rely on assumptions, shortcuts, and cognitive biases. Good thinking often requires slowing down, examining evidence, and challenging our initial conclusions. Daniel Goleman’s work on emotional intelligence similarly reminds us that effective thinking is not purely analytical. Self-awareness, empathy, emotional regulation, and social awareness play critical roles in how people make decisions and interact with others.

The importance of thinking skills is becoming even greater in the age of artificial intelligence. For decades, schools and organisations have rewarded people for possessing information. Today, information is increasingly abundant and accessible. Artificial intelligence can retrieve facts, generate reports, summarise research, and answer questions in seconds. As AI becomes more capable, the value of simply knowing things will decline. The premium will shift toward asking better questions, exercising sound judgement, evaluating evidence, solving novel problems, and making wise decisions. In other words, the future belongs not to those who know the most but to those who think the best.

Sir Ken Robinson famously argued that education systems often prioritise conformity and standardisation at the expense of creativity and innovation. Organisations frequently make a similar mistake. Employees are rewarded for following procedures, avoiding mistakes, and staying within established boundaries. While these behaviours have their place, they can inadvertently suppress curiosity, initiative, and independent thought. So, what can organisations do to create cultures where people think more effectively?

The first is to teach questions, not just answers. Many leaders are quick to provide solutions. Yet innovation often begins not with a better answer but with a better question. Leaders should routinely ask: What evidence supports this conclusion? What assumptions are we making? What alternatives have we considered? What might we be missing? These questions encourage deeper analysis and better decisions.

Second, organisations must normalise constructive challenge. Amy Edmondson’s research on psychological safety shows that people are more willing to contribute ideas, raise concerns, and challenge assumptions when they feel safe to do so. In many organisations, employees remain silent because questioning authority is perceived as risky. The result is groupthink. Leaders who encourage respectful disagreement often make better decisions because more perspectives are considered.

Third, organisations should create deliberate opportunities for reflection. Experience alone does not produce learning; reflected-upon experience does. Practices such as after-action reviews, project retrospectives, lessons-learned sessions, and structured debriefs help teams examine what worked, what failed, and what should be done differently. These practices convert experience into insight.

Fourth, leaders should reward thinking, not just compliance. Too often, organisations celebrate people who execute instructions efficiently while overlooking and sometimes punishing those who challenge assumptions, identify risks, suggest improvements, or solve difficult problems. Recognition systems send powerful signals about what an organisation truly values. If leaders want better thinking, they must visibly reward it.

The irony is that organisations spend enormous resources trying to improve products, services, and customer experiences while paying relatively little attention to the quality of thinking that produces them. In a world increasingly shaped by automation and artificial intelligence, the competitive advantage will not be access to information. It will be the ability to think critically, creatively, and wisely about that information. Organisations and schools that continue to focus primarily on teaching people what to think will struggle to keep pace. Those who invest in teaching people how to think will create better employees, better leaders, better citizens, and ultimately, better products.

Omagbitse Barrow is the chief executive of Efiko Management Consulting, and he supports organisations and leaders to translate their strategy to results.