Business documents are central to the operation of business.

Such documents include sales agreements, vendor contracts, mortgage terms, loan
applications, purchase orders, invoices, financial statements, employment agreements and a wide many more. The information in such business
documents is presented in natural language, and can be organized in a variety of ways from straight text, multi-column formats, and a wide variety
of tables. Understanding these documents is made challenging due to inconsistent formats, poor quality scans and OCR, internal cross
references, and complex document structure. Furthermore, these documents often reflect complex legal agreements and reference, explicitly or
implicitly, regulations, legislation, case law and standard business practices.

The ability to read, understand and interpret business documents, collectively referred to here as “Document Intelligence”, is a critical and
challenging application of artificial intelligence (AI) in business. While a variety of research has advanced the fundamentals of document
understanding, the majority have focused on documents found on the web which fail to capture the complexity of analysis and types of
understanding needed across business documents. Realizing the vision of document intelligence remains a research challenge that requires a
multi-disciplinary perspective spanning not only natural language processing and understanding, but also computer vision, knowledge
representation and reasoning, information retrieval, and more -- all of which have been profoundly impacted and advanced by neural network-
based approaches and deep learning in the last few years.

In addition to invited talks and open discussions on topics related to document intelligence, the workshop program will include a poster session
which provides an opportunity to present peer-reviewed work on the topic of Document Intelligence. We are soliciting submissions of short
research and vision papers of PDF format from 2 to 4 pages for presentation at the Poster session, as follows:

2-page limit: Abstracts of already published contributions in Top-Tier venues (with a focus on parts relevant topics to document intelligence),
description of datasets, position and vision papers, as well as papers describing industry, scientific or theoretical challenges
4-page limit: Original research contributions, or abstracts of papers rejected/recycled papers from NeurIPS or other top-tier venues (not published
contributions). The research contributions may discuss technical challenges of reading and interpreting business documents and present research
results.
It is expected that one of the authors of accepted contributions will attend the workshop to present the work, along with a poster, in the workshop's
Poster Session. Accepted contributions will be made publicly available as non-archival reports, allowing future submissions to archival
conferences or journals.

The topics of interest to the workshop include but are not limited to the following:

Document modeling, and representations

Document structure and layout learning
Cleansing and image enhancement techniques for scanned documents
Information extraction from text, and semi-structured documents
Linguistic analysis of document content
Natural language reasoning, and inference
Question answering on business documents
Semantic understanding of document content
Document search, and clustering
Handwritten recognition in business documents
Table identification and extraction from business documents
Chart learning, and understanding
Domain-specific document understanding
Knowledge representation for business documents
Multi-lingual document understanding methods and frameworks
Integrated syntax and semantic approaches for document understanding
Transfer learning methods for business document reading and understanding

EY is uncovering insight with

document intelligence solutions
These AI-powered products are a fast-growing segment of the nearly
US$60 billion global AI market. Their use is helping companies overcome
a number of challenges
By Austin Malchar on 08 November 2019

This article was originally published in the Autumn 2019 issue of The Record. Subscribe for FREE here to get the next issues
delivered directly to your inbox.
According to IDC, worldwide spending on artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive systems will reach US$57.6 billion by 2021, an
illustration of just how quickly AI technologies are finding homes in mainstream use cases.

One such use case is document review and processing, which increasingly is being handled by emerging document intelligence
solutions such as the one EY and Microsoft have built on AI-based Microsoft technologies including Azure Search, Azure Machine
Learning, and Power BI. These solutions are transforming how forward-thinking companies review, process, and ultimately glean
valuable insights from a wide range of business documents.

All large companies deal with mountains of documents on a regular basis – everything from contracts, invoices, purchase orders, and
policies and procedures, to reports, activity logs, and e-mails. But processing these documents today is a manual, human-intensive
effort that’s costly, time consuming, error prone and inconsistent. Worse, it prevents organisations from using the content in these
documents to make better decisions and identify ways to improve business performance.

EY believes document intelligence solutions can help companies overcome these shortcomings by automating document review and
processing with AI and related technologies.

EY has found that document intelligence solutions, on average, can help companies reduce document review and processing time by
90%, decrease costs by 80%, and cut risk by 20%. At the same time, they can increase processing accuracy by 25% and consistency
by 50%.v

A media and entertainment company has experienced firsthand the impact such a solution can have. The company wanted to automate
how it assesses the safety of its products because its current processes couldn’t scale to meet its ever-growing product portfolio and
the number of lab reports needing to be assessed. EY worked with the company to implement and tune a Microsoft-based document
intelligence solution to replicate engineers’ decision-making process. The time to review and dispose of lab reports was nearly 200%
faster, and assessments were 10% more accurate, than when humans were involved.

As this company’s experience shows, document intelligence solutions have tremendous potential to transform how companies read,
interpret and act on the valuable insights hidden in their vast array of business documents. They’re also just one example of how EY
believes AI is poised to completely reshape the way companies do business in the not-too-distant future.
Documentation Intelligence
Enabling process automation through complex document digitisation

Digital and risk transformations are being driven by business process automation and the adoption of new technologies,
but there are still many tasks that are not easily digitised.

Documentation Intelligence is a new cloud based solution from Deloitte that takes standard Robotic Process Automation
(RPA) and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) to the next level of sophistication by introducing machine learning
powered extraction and analysis, combined with our business process expertise.

Reduce complex document processing time from days to minutes

Using Documentation Intelligence you can transform complex credit risk processes that currently rely on data in
unstructured documents and time consuming human analysis eg: financial spreading, financial prospecting, payslips,
surveyor valuations, tax returns, bank statements, contracts and more.

Documentation Intelligence extracts data from tables and notes in long and complex documents. Our solution can ingest,
manipulate, aggregate and deliver this data in the required format to downstream users and applications, in order to:

 Increase speed & efficiency; quickly extract the data you need from large volumes of documents;

 Increase quality & accuracy; reliably extract data and benefit from the scale and constant optimisation of our
solution;

 Free up capacity; allow you analysts to focus on more valuable and complex tasks; and

 Improve customer experience; reduce customer response times from days to minutes.

Advanced, reliable, data extraction

Typical OCR and document ingestion tools are not optimised for tabular and note based financial data extraction.
Documentation Intelligence uses a combination of OCR engines, metadata, machine learning, rules, algorithms and
tagging to identify required data points and context and reliably re-reconstruct data.

Scalable, secure and flexible cloud solution

Documentation Intelligence can ingest your documents via a user interface, API integration with your applications, RPA
robots or from external data sources such as Companies House. Documentation Intelligence uses a serverless cloud
architecture to rapidly process extract, and manipulate at scale. The solution offers flexibility as a pay-as-you-use
service, and can be customised and trained for your specific process needs.
How to Train Someone to Translate Business Problems into
Analytics Questions
Jonathan Knowles/Getty Images

Analytics translators perform some of the most essential functions for integrating analytics capabilities in a company. They define
business problems that analytics can help solve, guide technical teams in the creation of analytics-driven solutions to these problems, and
embed solutions into business operations. It’s specialized work, calling for strong business acumen, some technical knowledge, and
project management and delivery chops.

Deploying translators is especially important during a company’s early efforts to use analytics, when much of its analytics know-how
resides in a small cohort of data leaders and practitioners. We’ve seen companies hatch ambitious plans to apply analytics in dozens of
situations—only to pull back because they employ too few people who can deliver solutions. That gap should shrink in the long term, as
analytics pervades business and analytics training becomes a standard part of employee development. But in the face of competitive
pressure, companies cannot wait to work with analytics on a large scale. Translators can help businesses climb the analytics learning
curve quickly and roll out more use cases than they might otherwise.

While translators can acquire some of the requisite knowledge for the job through coursework, they make the most impact once they
have developed practical skills through on-the-job experience. Yet it is all too common for executives to assume that employees can act
as effective translators, capable of delivering analytics solutions, once they complete a class on the rudiments of modeling. In fact,
employees who only receive classroom training are more like teenagers who sit through a driver’s-education course, then walk outside
and try to drive away—with no behind-the-wheel training, supervised practice, or road sense.

Translators can only master their trade by observing seasoned colleagues at work and then working on actual problems with expert
guidance. This progressive, real-world learning approach prepares translators to manage diverse teams of specialists, create replicable
workflows, and apply business judgment while assessing trade-offs. None of these steps can be skipped if a company hopes to apply
analytics widely and generate significant value.

Recruiting translators and positioning them for impact

Before launching a translator-training effort, executives should map out a company’s analytics strategy and priorities. Then they can
determine how many translators are needed in each part of the business—and target recruiting and training programs accordingly.

Translators typically sit within business units, in proximity to day-to-day operations in stores, plants, mines, call centers, and other sites
where employees make products or deal with customers. These vantage points let them spot uses for analytics and ensure that analytics
solutions are embedded into the business for impact.

Ideally, translators will have spent time working in business operations before starting translator training. Existing business staff often
make better translators than new hires because they have an important quality that is hard to teach: knowledge of a business domain
where analytics will be applied. To put this another way, business operations are the typical translator’s “mother tongue.”

In addition to business acumen, other qualities companies should look for in internal translator candidates include comfort working with
numbers, project management skill, and entrepreneurial spirit. Training curricula can then concentrate on the technical knowledge and
practical methods that translators need.

Building basic analytics awareness

The first stage of a translator-training program should equip employees with fundamental analytics knowledge: a basic understanding of
how analytical techniques can help solve typical business problems, as well as general familiarity with the process of developing
analytics use cases.

This level of knowledge is readily attained from a week or so of classroom training covering:

 The potential to use analytics broadly within their industry and, more specifically, across
the business’s value chain.
 General techniques for prioritizing analytics use cases and defining their scope.
 An overview, and ideally a simulation, of the lifecycle of an analytics use case: defining a
business problem, selecting target variables, brainstorming features of a potential solution,
and interpreting results.
 The roles that translators and other specialists (such as data scientists, data engineers,
technical architects, and user-experience designers) play at each stage of an analytics use
case.
  The major types of analytical approaches (descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive), with
deep dives into a few common algorithms (such as decision trees, neural nets, and random
forests) and how they apply to business problems.
 Methods for evaluating the performance of analytics models and understanding the trade-
offs associated with particular models.
 Agile ways of working—testing and learning from short development cycles, or “sprints”—
that help multi-functional teams to deliver effective solutions swiftly.
 Practices for embedding analytics solutions in the business and overcoming implementation
difficulties, such as cultural barriers.

Translators also need the technical depth to hold their own when discussing problem-solving approaches with data scientists. Many take
online tutorials to learn common programming languages, such as R or Python, and learn more complex algorithms. To lead delivery of
use cases, though, translators must hone their skills through hands-on practice—much as language students reinforce their classroom
learning when they are immersed among native speakers.

Developing the ability to deliver analytics use cases

An analytics use case follows an end-to-end process that is applicable to a wide range of business problems. The translator first helps
define a business problem and “translates” it to data scientists in technical terms. She then confirms that the selected analytical technique
solves the problem cleanly and efficiently, and she might collaborate with designers if the use case calls for a tool for front-line
colleagues.

The process concludes with implementation of the analytics solution, which the translator facilitates by helping users incorporate it into
their routines. This often includes explaining to end users what takes place inside the “black box” of a model, so they can be comfortable
leveraging the insights it delivers.

Most translators learn the delivery process through classroom or online study and then master them during apprenticeships. They start by
observing expert translators on the job and gradually assume more responsibility, culminating with responsibility for teaching others. The
typical progression consists of the following stages:

 Shadowing an experienced translator on one or more use cases.

 Leading use cases under the supervision of an experienced translator.
  Leading use cases independently, turning to experienced translators for help with specific
difficulties.
 Coaching apprentice translators on the pathway described above.

There’s no fixed number of use cases that translators must complete at each stage to progress their abilities. The right number is the
number that prepares translators to advance to the next stage, and it can vary with the range and sophistication of the analytical
techniques and business problems that a translator deals with, among other factors.

Our experience suggests that translators spend six to twelve months in training. Others may be ready sooner. One translator at McKinsey
started training with a degree in engineering and several years of consulting experience, which had taught him to structure and solve
business problems. After studying data science in a week-long executive-education course, he worked alongside an experienced
translator and then began leading use cases. Now he’s not only a productive translator, but he also serves as a teaching assistant in
analytics classes.

Since companies that are just beginning to implement use cases usually don’t have experienced translators, some rely on external
translators to deliver their first wave of use cases and oversee their initial apprentices. Once three or four employees have learned to
deliver use cases, they can train new apprentices.

Translator training is one of the most important analytics investments a company can make, because companies seldom capture the full
value of analytics without capable translators. The key to training a translation workforce is a multi-tiered progression, in which
employees study concepts in a classroom before mastering new skills through apprenticeships. Translators connect the theory and the
practice of analytics; their training courses must do the same.

3 Simple Habits to Improve Your Critical Thinking

Daniel Day/Getty Images

A few years ago, a CEO assured me that his company was the market leader. “Clients will not leave for competitors,” he added. “It costs
too much for them to switch.” Within weeks, the manufacturing giant Procter & Gamble elected not to renew its contract with the firm.
The CEO was shocked — but he shouldn’t have been.
For more than 20 years, I’ve helped struggling organizations. Sometimes they reach out because they have been mismanaged. Sometimes
they have not stayed in front of changing technologies. In a few cases, members of the senior team were simply negligent. But in my
experience, these organizational problems shared a root cause: A lack of critical thinking.

Too many business leaders are simply not reasoning through pressing issues, taking the time to evaluate a topic from all sides. Leaders
often jump to the first conclusion, whatever the evidence. Even worse, C-suite leaders will just choose the evidence that supports their
prior beliefs. A lack of metacognition — or thinking about thinking — is also a major driver, making people simply overconfident.

The good news is that critical thinking is a learned skill. To help people get better at it, I recently started the nonprofit Reboot
Foundation. Based on my personal experience as well some of the work of our researchers, I’ve pulled together three simple things that
you can do to improve your critical thinking skills:

1. Question assumptions
2. Reason through logic
3. Diversify thought

Now, you might be thinking, “I do that already.” And you probably do, but just not as deliberately and thoroughly as you could.
Cultivating these three key habits of mind go a long way in helping you become better at an increasingly desired skill in the job market.

Question assumptions

When I work to turn around an organization, I’ll typically start by questioning the firm’s assumptions. I once visited dozens of stores of a
retail chain, posing as a shopper. I soon discovered that the company had presumed that its customers had far more disposable income
than they really had. This erroneous belief made the company overprice its clothing. They would have made millions more each year if
they had sold lower-priced shirts and pants.

Of course, it’s hard to question everything. Imagine going through your day asking yourself: Is the sky really blue? What if the person
next to me isn’t my colleague but her twin sister? How do I really know that the economy won’t implode tomorrow?

The first step in questioning assumptions, then, is figuring out when to question assumptions. Turns out, a questioning approach is
particularly helpful when the stakes are high.
So if you are in a discussion about long-term company strategy upon which years of effort and expense will be based, be sure to ask basic
questions about your beliefs: How do you know that business will increase? What does the research say about your expectations about
the future of the market? Have you taken time to step into the figurative shoes of your customers as a “secret shopper”?

Another way to question your assumptions is to consider alternatives. You might ask: What if our clients changed? What if our suppliers
went out of business? These sorts of questions help you gain new and important perspectives that help hone your thinking.

Reason through logic

Years ago, I took on the task of turning around the division of a large lingerie company. The growth of one of its major product lines had
been declining for years. No one could figure out why.

It turned out that the company had made the reasoning mistake of over-generalization, drawing a sweeping conclusion based on limited
or insufficient evidence. Namely, the company believed that all of their international customers had similar preferences in lingerie. So it
shipped the same styles of brassieres to every store across Europe.

When my team started talking to staff and consumers, we realized that customers in different countries reported very distinct tastes and
preferences. British women, for example, tended to buy lacy bras in bright colors. Italian women preferred beige bras, with no lace. And
those in the United States led the world in sports bra purchases.

For this lingerie company, improving their reasoning helped the firm dramatically improve its bottom line. The good news is that the
formal practice of logic dates back at least 2,000 years to Aristotle. Over those two millennia, logic has demonstrated its merit by
reaching sound conclusions.

So at your organization, pay close attention to the “chain” of logic constructed by a particular argument. Ask yourself: Is the argument
supported at every point by evidence? Do all the pieces of evidence build on each other to produce a sound conclusion?

Being aware of common fallacies can also allow you to think more logically. For instance, people often engage in what’s known as “post
hoc” thinking. In this fallacy, people believe that “because event Y followed event X, event Y must have been caused by event X.”

So, for instance, a manager may believe that their sales agents rack up more sales in the spring because they’re fired up by the
motivational speeches offered at the annual sales conference in February — but until that assumption is tested, there’s no way the
manager can know if their belief is correct.
Seek out diversity of thought and collaboration

For years, I was the only female partner on McKinsey’s transformation team. And today, while I serve on more than a half-dozen
corporate boards, I am typically the only Asian and the only woman in the room during meetings.

By virtue of my background and life experiences, I tend to see things differently from the people around me. This has often played to my
advantage. But I’m not immune to groupthink, either. When I’m around people similar to me for whatever reason — age, politics,
religion— I try to solicit different points of view. It makes me a better thinker.

It’s natural for people to group themselves together with people who think or act like them. This happens especially readily online, where
it’s so easy to find a specific cultural niche. Social media algorithms can narrow our perspectives further, serving up only news that fits
our individual beliefs.

This is a problem. If everyone in our social circles thinks as we do, we become more rigid in our thinking, and less likely to change our
beliefs on the basis of new information. In fact, the more people listen to people who share their views, research shows the more
polarized their views become.

It’s crucial to get outside your personal bubble. You can start small. If you work in accounting, make friends with people in marketing. If
you always go to lunch with senior staff, go to a ball game with your junior colleagues. Training yourself this way will help you escape
your usual thinking and gain richer insights.

In team settings, give people the chance to give their opinions independently without the influence of the group. When I ask for advice,
for instance, I typically withhold my own preferences and ask team members to email me their opinions in separate notes. This tactic
helps prevent people from engaging in groupthink.

While these simple tactics may sound easy or even obvious, they’re rare in practice, particularly in the business world, and too many
organizations don’t take the time to engage in robust forms of reasoning. But the important work of critical thinking pays off. While luck
plays a role — sometimes small, sometimes large — in a company’s successes, the most important business victories are achieved
through thinking smart.

Helen Lee Bouygues is the president of the Paris-based Reboot Foundation. A former partner at McKinsey & Company, she has served as
interim CEO, CFO, or COO for more than one dozen companies.
Improve Your Critical Thinking at Work
Helen Lee Bouygues, founder of the Reboot Foundation, believes that a lack of critical thinking is responsible for many business
failures. She says organizational leaders often rely too heavily on expertise and then jump to conclusions. Instead, leaders should
deliberately approach each problem and devote time thinking through possible solutions. The good news, she says, is that critical
thinking skills can developed and practiced over time. Bouygues is the author of the HBR.org article “3 Simple Habits to Improve Your
Critical Thinking.”

TRANSCRIPT

CURT NICKISCH: Welcome to the HBR IdeaCast from Harvard Business Review. I’m Curt Nickisch.

You know the story. Maybe it’s even a nightmare of yours. One day, the company is flying high. No reason to change anything.
Customers and contracts will always be there.

And then one day – the money stops flowing in, and the business is suddenly in real trouble.

Our guest today knows this all too well. She has been an interim CEO, CFO, or COO at more than one dozen companies. Sometimes
they needed her because they were mismanaged. Some failed to stay in front of changing technologies. In a few cases, members of the
senior team were simply negligent. But in her experience, all these organizational problems shared one root cause: A lack of critical
thinking.

Our guest is Helen Lee Bouygues. She’s the founder of the Reboot Foundation. Based in Paris, the nonprofit helps parents, teachers and
employers think more critically about their problems. She’s also the author of the HBR.org article “3 Simple Habits to Improve Your
Critical Thinking.” Helen, thanks for being here.

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Thank you for having me Curt.

CURT NICKISCH: Helen, you worked in transitional periods for a bunch of big companies. And, you say that many people’s business
problems really come down to simple errors in critical thinking. That just sounds a little surprising to me and I wanted to hear why you
say that.
HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Yeah, I think at first glance people believe that critical thinking is something that we do every day and it
comes very natural. But in reality, critical thinking is not only extremely important for success in life, but it’s also something that needs
to be learned and practiced.

Critical thinking skills are very much predictive of making positive financial decisions, even more so than raw intelligence, but people
kind of forget what that actually means in terms of tools and practices that they need to exercise in order to make the right decisions, or at
least the better decisions.

Based on my 20 years of different turnaround and transformation experience, I have noticed that very often when things go sideways or
create problems and companies find themselves in a situation of a need for turnaround, it’s typically been because I would argue that the
leadership perhaps lacked some elements of critical thinking.

CURT NICKISCH: Why do you think we lack critical thinking skills, or why do you think we think we’re better at it than we actually
are?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: That’s a great question Curt and actually we did a survey at the Reboot Foundation about a year ago, where
we asked people questions of everything from ranging from how often do they practice critical thinking to how important they think
critical thinking is, and how often they teach their children critical thinking?

I think one of the reasons why it’s more difficult in today’s day and age is that we live in a world of incessant distraction and technology
is often to blame as well. We live in a period when we have a question, we want that instant gratification getting the information, just
typing the question on Google, having the answer quickly and so, we don’t actually have as much time to stop and think.

And part of the necessity of critical thinking is having that ability to take a step back and actually think about your own thinking. And
yet, it’s actually becoming more and more critical because as businesses evolve and there’s more urgency to make decisions, that’s
exactly when we need to do more critical thinking than perhaps we used to, because of evolving technology and rapidly changing
competitive environments in business.

CURT NICKISCH: You say that getting better at critical thinking is something we can learn and cultivate?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Yes. The opposite of critical thinking could be selective thinking. And naturally selective thinking is
something that you can actually do relatively quickly because it’s just a reinforcement of your own opinion. People in business can get
better at critical thinking if they just do three things. One, question assumptions. Two, reason through logic. And three, diversify thought.
CURT NICKISCH: How do you actually do that?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: So, the taking a break, and that doesn’t mean doing meditation or yoga, but actually taking the time. It could
be going for a run, or a walk around the block. That alone creates that opportunity for an individual to take the time to stop and think. So,
that’s one dimension I think that people need to put in their normal practice.

The second element that you wouldn’t necessarily think about in terms of an attribute necessary for critical thinking is management of
emotions. So, the number of times that you can imagine, especially in a boardroom for a company that’s going through a difficulty,
heated discussions, insults across the room. In that type of environment, it’s very difficult to engage in rational thinking.

As much emotions are important, when it comes to true important decisions, we need to put aside the feelings and emotions that go awry
in a meeting setting. In addition to that, I think the other element of what we need to make sure that we conduct is making sure that we
have other points of views.

CURT NICKISCH: When you talk about looking at things from opposing viewpoints, sometimes that’s helpful when you have
somebody who plays that role, or when you have a diverse team that you can share ideas with and explore. I don’t know that all of us are
as good of just thinking from other perspectives when we’re kind of just in our own thoughts.

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Yeah, but it’s again, that’s why I think I started off this conversation Curt, in saying that critical thinking is
something that you actually need to practice and you need to learn. Because indeed, it’s natural and it’s very human to stay in your own
personal bubble because it’s comfortable.

But you can actually do this from a small scale to a larger scale, and what I mean by that specifically is if you’re starting small, if you
work in for example, in accounting. Go have lunch with people in marketing in your organization.

I have a good friend, Mathilde Thomas, she’s actually the founder of Caudalie which is a very successful line of skincare products made
from grapes. Mathilde grew up spending her time in her family vineyards, so her family originally was in the wine business. And the idea
of the skincare product came about because one day a friend of the family, this physician, came to visit the vineyard and he was looking
at the vat of grape skins that were about to be discarded and he said, well that’s a pot of treasure, so why are you just discarding that
away? And that’s effectively how the business of Caudalie actually began.
So, that’s a positive story where people who are not necessarily in the same field can get together and actually come up with innovation
or here it wasn’t even intended to be an innovation. It just was an idea that sprung from two people from different walks of life getting
together and coming up with the business idea. So, that’s a positive example in terms of diversity.

CURT NICKISCH: Where have you seen this failure in some of the companies that you worked with? Where have you seen the inability
to diversify thought and opinions and host costly that can be?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: I think in terms of negative, I’ve seen a specific example for a pharmaceutical company where the founder
brought in a CFO who actually had very little experience in accounting. He had experience in mergers and acquisitions, in elements of
financing, but not pure accounting.

But his true qualification of becoming the CFO was the fact that he was a very, very good friend of the CEO’s and you see that example
over and over again, including in boards. The number of times you see the board of a company being surrounded, the CEO being
surrounded by his or her friends, which is why often I think from time to time, you have companies, publicly listed companies where
sometimes the board may not see certain indications.

Be it the case of a Steinhoff or an Enron, which is an extreme case of fraud, but even in terms of general decisions, strategic decisions,
that if you have a board composed of just a group of friends of the CEO’s, you don’t have diversity of thought in that type of
environment.

CURT NICKISCH: So, we’ve talked some about questioning assumptions and the power of diversifying thought. But another point you
make is that people need to get better about reasoning through logic. And I think this is going to surprise people too because logical is
just such a household word. We think that we think logically, so why is logic a deficit and kind of a prerequisite for the critical thinking
you think we need to see more of in management?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: So, one of the stories that I like to bring up is a specific company that I encountered a couple of years ago.
It’s one of the world’s largest producers of aluminum tubes and they have clients ranging from L’Oréal to Proctor and Gamble, all over
the world.

And the CEO of this company was blindsided by his own fervor and probably unreasonable optimism about the outlook for the revenue
profile of this company. In reality, the company was in relatively dire financial straits, but again he was blinded with his hope that his
clients would never leave because the switching costs of his clients would be too high, or that at least was his hypothesis.
And for some business leaders I think some optimism is obviously a good thing. There wouldn’t be Ubers or EBays if we didn’t have
entrepreneurs who have that charisma and exuberance. But what I often find in companies is CEOss with something I call simply WTF.
Now Curt, that’s not what you think that we commonly use in text messages, but it’s for me it’s “wishful thinking forever’.

And I think that blinded optimism can often mask the capability and the ability to reason through logic and actually re-question your
approach and saying, “well, can my customers decide to change vendors? Is the competitive environment actually shifting? Are there
low-cost companies that could actually take over my business even if that hurdle rate is high?”

So, it’s again coming back to being able to ask the right questions and looking at your business and saying, “is there a different way of
doing things?” And that’s when you avoid the pitfalls of actually reasoning through logic.

And it comes back to the argument of having different views from your original views and your original sentiments. And obviously in
order to do that, we need to really pay close attention to our own chain of logic.

CURT NICKISCH: Which I like by the way, wishful thinking forever. I’m going to read text messages that way now. Probably make
them a little more optimistic. Yeah.

A lot of companies pay consultants to do this kind of critical thinking for them and they come in with tools and concept mapping, and all
of the sorts of things that maybe they’re a little more deliberate about and also, removed from the emotion of working in the culture of a
company. Do you see consultants as essentially paid critical thinkers?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: I think many consultants are good at critical thinking. I don’t believe that the industry of management
consulting is a sector that is there to enforce critical thinking for companies. And let me explain why I believe that. A lot of, in a lot of
situations CEOs seek validation and look for evidence that supports their preconceived notions. And consultants are often trained to
agree with their client’s theories.

So, I would almost counter argue and say, for CEOs to effectively use consultants, they almost need to be very precise and be very
upfront in their scope of work with the consultants, demand and ask that the consulting firm give a different point of view, or an opposing
point of view than the original thesis of a leader.

Now that is sometimes hard to do. It goes back to the original part of our discussion. It’s less comfortable for leaders and in a lot of
situations why CEO’s are hiring consultants are to justify and explain with more detail to their boards of why they’re doing certain
strategic activities. So, that’s where we have to be careful about relying on consultants as quote, “a mechanism to do better critical
thinking in business”.

CURT NICKISCH: Have you actually seen companies turn around when they change the way they approach problems and instituted
critical thinking across the organization in a more deliberate way?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Yes. I worked with a telecom company in Africa, not so long ago. And they had probably the lowest
customer satisfaction rate across the board, amongst the different countries in Africa. And the CEO was somebody who was a very open
minded, wanted to challenge – now you could argue Curt, they were on the low, they couldn’t get lower in terms of customer
satisfaction, so they only had room to go up.

But if you put that aside, what he instituted was to have a sub group of his team to go visit another South African country that had very
high customer satisfaction rates. So, it was, I would call creating an environment for its employees to have a bit of a diversity of thought,
but also to actually be exposed to give the capacity for its employees to question the assumptions about what they were doing wrong.

So, very good CEOs not only are capable of trying to conduct metacognition for him or herself, meaning questioning his or her own way
of thinking, but he’ll challenge his team and help them to challenge their own way of thinking by showing different examples of for
example, success stories in the same type of work where in a case of this telecom company in Africa, where they could see and visit
customer services centers in other African countries where they had high customer satisfaction rate.

So, it’s giving the exposure to its team to seek out diversity of thought, but also promoting that, and encouraging that its employees think
differently than being focused on their own silos of work and being, trying to be efficient in their own capacity, in their existing
dimension.

CURT NICKISCH: Yeah. So, if that was a good critical thinker, as a CEO, what do most leaders do in that situation? What does the
“uncritical thinker” do?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: The uncritical thinker would be to try to gain more efficiency out of its existing employees and continue to
do more of the same thing. But probably putting in more KPI’s. That’s a popular thing that leaders do. And try to put more pressure in
the system so that companies are more productive. Rather than thinking out of the box and trying to say, should we be doing something
differently than the way we’re doing it today?
CURT NICKISCH: And for individuals? Because whether or not you have a CEO who’s good at this, you can still affect your own team
and you can still affect your own work with your own critical thinking. What should they do to get better at critical thinking?

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Be curious. Ask the questions. “ What if” questions are great. It’s important to constantly challenge yourself
saying, what if I did something differently than the way I’m doing it now? What if I approached my client differently than the way I’m
doing it now? What if I changed the processes? Would there be improvement? That’s the type of individual who can improve by actually
questioning the assumptions of what he or she is doing on a daily basis.

And then the second element again, is trying to be very factual and be rigid about gathering facts and proof and accumulating data in
order to truly justify why you’re doing what you’re doing. It’s going back to paying close attention to the chain of your own logic.

And then the third is expanding your horizon by interacting with people that are not in your existing silo. So, I go back to the example,
very simple example, go have lunch, go have a drink with somebody that’s not in your same department, but go reach out to somebody
who’s in a totally different building, or even different division within your group.

CURT NICKISCH: Helen, thanks for coming on the show and talking about thinking through how to be a better critical thinker.

HELEN LEE BOUYGUES: Thank you so much. It was a real pleasure to be on your show.

CURT NICKISCH: That’s Helen Lee Bouygues. She’s the founder of the Paris-based Reboot Foundation and the author of the HBR.org
article “3 Simple Habits to Improve Your Critical Thinking.”

This episode was produced by Mary Dooe. We get technical help from Rob Eckhardt. Adam Buchholz is our audio product manager.

Thanks for listening to the HBR IdeaCast. I’m Curt Nickisch.

Critical Thinking in Business Analysis: Why it Counts

“Five percent of the people think; Ten percent of the people think they think; and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.”

― Thomas A. Edison
Business analysts are paid to think. Thinking is a force of habit that defines us and the quality of the decisions we make. If the numbers

from Thomas Edison are anything to go by, our ability to think through situations should never be taken for granted.

Critical thinking is an extremely important quality that should be nurtured, refined and actively applied to every decision we make.

What exactly is Critical Thinking?

“Your mind is working at its best when you're being paranoid.

You explore every avenue and possibility of your situation

at high-speed and with total clarity.”

― Banksy, Banging Your Head Against a Brick Wall

In simple terms, critical thinking may be defined as "reasonable reflective thinking focused on deciding what to believe or do". Another

definition by the Critical Thinking Community is: "a mode of thinking, about any subject, content, or problem where the thinker improves the

quality of his or her thinking by skilfully analyzing, assessing, and reconstructing reality. Critical thinking is self-directed, self-disciplined,

self-monitored and self-corrective thinking."

Being critical is like being paranoid – Not taking everything you hear or read at face value. Critical thinking creates opportunities for

exhaustive analysis which in turn, leads to well-informed decisions.

Why bother?
 We need critical thinking for practically everything we do - academics, work and even in our personal lives. BAs should be able to hold

logical debates from the beginning to the end. We are often required to think and speak quickly within a short frame of time. Our work also

demands that we hypothesize connections between ideas while thinking on our feet. Thinking the right way the first time, can save a lot of

rework down the line. We must be critical of our own ideas and other people’s ideas.

Being critical allows the BA to confirm which requirements are valid.

Don’t take what you hear or read at face value. Weigh up the evidence provided by stakeholders and consider the implications or

consequences of their suggestions before making a recommendation. For example, a requirement may sound straightforward until you

consider its impact. Will the requirement necessitate the inclusion of an associated requirement? Will allocating such a requirement to the

first release affect the project deadline and available resources? Can the inclusion of the requirement be justified? For example, a

stakeholder may state in simple terms, “I need a report on the number of job applications we receive”. Being critical implies drumming up

questions like:

 Why is this report needed?

 Who will be the recipient of the report and how will it be used?

 Is this report similar to any existing report?

 In what categories should the applications be presented?

 Which locations should the report cover?

 What is the anticipated frequency of use?

 In what format should the report be presented – Graphs or tabular form?

At the end of your analysis, you may discover that: 1) A similar report already exists which can be modified to suit the requirement, 2) The

report may not be necessary at all – perhaps what the stakeholder really needs is a single functionality for adding up the total number of

applications per month or 3) The frequency of use may imply that the requirement should be assigned a lower priority or even deferred till a

later phase.

This hypothetical example of the application of critical thinking shows how a lot of time can be saved from the get-go as opposed to a

situation where the analyst just takes the requirements at face value without finding out what the “real” requirements are.

In certain situations, a stakeholder may put forward a requirement that’s not necessarily tied to any
business value but rather to their own increased convenience. Being critical allows the BA to distinguish
between requirements that add value to the business and tho se that should be given a lesser priority.

There’s a huge difference between what a user wants and what they need. Being critical means separating “bells and whistles” functionality

from the core functionality the system should deliver.

In seeking improvements, it’s also useful to consider if users have a valid justification for why they do things a certain way. You may find

that when a person does things a certain way for so long, they may not have a valid reason for retaining these practices or even understand

the reasons why these practices were encouraged in the first place. If the reasons for maintaining status quo are unclear and there are

visible flaws in a process, there’s no reason not to improve it.

Being critical assists the BA in questioning stakeholder assumptions and concerns

Some assumptions or concerns are valid while others are not. If a stakeholder shares a concern, the onus is on the BA to investigate the

concern and ascertain its validity. One of the things the BA may want to find out is if stakeholder concerns are “general” concerns shared by

others or if they’re isolated concerns stemming from a single experience one stakeholder had in the past. For example, a stakeholder may

state, “Our current system is slow – it doesn’t generate reports quickly enough”. This statement requires further investigation. The BA

should in this instance, verify how much data crunching is needed to generate the report, the speed of the network and if other users have

encountered the same problem. The user for instance, could have been running a complex report over a poor network connection. Such

claims should be investigated critically before recommendations are made.

The key takeaway is to be investigative in your approach; you never know what you may find.

Here's an interesting insight to critical thinking by Stever Robbins

April 08, 2013/ Comment

Business Analyst Career

Critical Thinking In Business Analysis

Critical Thinking Definition, Skills, and Examples

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••• Kelvin Murray / Getty Images

By Alison Doyle

Updated October 06, 2019

What is critical thinking? Critical thinking refers to the ability to analyze information objectively and make a reasoned
judgment. It involves the evaluation of sources, such as data, facts, observable phenomena, and research findings.

Good critical thinkers can draw reasonable conclusions from a set of information, and discriminate between useful and
less useful details to solve problems or make decisions.

Why Do Employers Value Critical Thinking Skills?

Employers want job candidates who can evaluate a situation using logical thought and offer the best solution.

Someone with critical thinking skills can be trusted to make decisions independently, and will not need constant
handholding.

Critical thinking abilities are among the most sought-after skills in almost every industry and workplace. You can
demonstrate critical thinking by using related keywords in your resume and cover letter, and during your interview.

Examples of Critical Thinking

The circumstances that demand critical thinking vary from industry to industry. Some examples include:

 A triage nurse analyzes the cases at hand and decides the order by which the patients should be treated.
 A plumber evaluates the materials that would best suit a particular job.
 An attorney reviews evidence and devises a strategy to win a case or to decide whether to settle out of court.
  A manager analyzes customer feedback forms and uses this information to develop a customer service training
session for employees.

Promote Your Skills in Your Job Search

If critical thinking is a key phrase in the job listings you are applying for, be sure to emphasize your critical thinking
skills throughout your job search.

Add Keywords to Your Resume

You can use critical thinking keywords (analytical, problem solving, creativity, etc.) in your resume. When describing
your work history, include any of the skills listed below that accurately describe you. You can also include them in
your resume summary, if you have one.

For example, your summary might read, “Marketing Associate with five years of experience in project management.
Skilled in conducting thorough market research and competitor analysis to assess market trends and client needs, and to
develop appropriate acquisition tactics.”

Mention Skills in Your Cover Letter

Include these critical thinking skills in your cover letter. In the body of your letter, mention one or two of these skills,
and give specific examples of times when you have demonstrated those skills at work. Think about times when you had
to analyze or evaluate materials to solve a problem.

Show the Interviewer Your Skills

You can use these skill words in an interview. Discuss a time when you were faced with a particular problem or
challenge at work and explain how you applied critical thinking to solve it.

Some interviewers will give you a hypothetical scenario or problem, and ask you to use critical thinking skills to solve
it. In this case, explain your thought process thoroughly to the interviewer. He or she is typically more focused on how
you arrive at your solution rather than the solution itself. The interviewer wants to see you use analysis and evaluation
(key parts of critical thinking) approach to the given scenario or problem.

Of course, each job will require different skills and experiences, so make sure you read the job description carefully
and focus on the skills listed by the employer.

© The Balance, 2018

Top Critical Thinking Skills

Analysis

Part of critical thinking is the ability to carefully examine something, whether it is a problem, a set of data, or a text.
People with analytical skills can examine information, understand what it means, and properly explain to others the
implications of that information.

 Asking Thoughtful Questions

 Data Analysis
 Research
 Interpretation
 Judgment
 Questioning Evidence
 Recognizing Patterns
 Skepticism
Communication

Often, you will need to share your conclusions with your employers or with a group of colleagues. You need to be able
to communicate with others to share your ideas effectively. You might also need to engage critical thinking in a group.
In this case, you will need to work with others and communicate effectively to figure out solutions to complex
problems.

 Active Listening
 Assessment
 Collaboration
 Explanation
 Interpersonal
 Presentation
 Teamwork
 Verbal Communication
 Written Communication

Creativity

Critical thinking often involves creativity and innovation. You might need to spot patterns in the information you are
looking at or come up with a solution that no one else has thought of before. All of this involves a creative eye that can
take a different approach from all other approaches.

 Flexibility
 Conceptualization
 Curiosity
 Imagination
 Drawing Connections
 Inferring
  Predicting
 Synthesizing
 Vision

Open-Mindedness

To think critically, you need to be able to put aside any assumptions or judgments and merely analyze the information
you receive. You need to be objective, evaluating ideas without bias.

 Diversity
 Fairness
 Humility
 Inclusive
 Objectivity
 Observation
 Reflection

Problem Solving

Problem solving is another critical thinking skill that involves analyzing a problem, generating and implementing a
solution, and assessing the success of the plan. Employers don’t simply want employees who can think about
information critically. They also need to be able to come up with practical solutions.

 Attention to Detail
 Clarification
 Decision Making
 Evaluation
 Groundedness
 Identifying Patterns
  Innovation

More Critical Thinking Skills

 Inductive Reasoning
 Deductive Reasoning
 Compliance
 Noticing Outliers
 Adaptability
 Emotional Intelligence
 Brainstorming
 Optimization
 Restructuring
 Integration
 Strategic Planning
 Project Management
 Ongoing Improvement
 Causal Relationships
 Case Analysis
 Diagnostics
 SWOT Analysis
 Business Intelligence
 Quantitative Data Management
 Qualitative Data Management
 Metrics
 Accuracy
 Risk Management
 Statistics
 Scientific Method
 Consumer Behavior