Online-Development Programme: Anti-Chaos: Critical Thinking for Complex Solutions

• Duration:18 March - 08 April
• Language: Ukrainian
• Time: 15:00 - 19:00
• New season starts on March 18th, 2026On Wednesdays, March 18, 25, April 1, 8, 15:00-19:00
• Fee for EBA members:12800 UAH
• Early Registration for EBA members:11000 UAH till February 25th, 2026
• Place: Will be online
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In the modern world, we are faced with a huge flow of information every day, where facts are intertwined with disinformation, and manipulative techniques are often disguised as logical arguments. It is very important to be able to assess the quality of information using clear criteria and verification tools, make informed decisions and avoid the influence of cognitive traps, formulate your position and find vulnerabilities in the arguments of opponents – all this in order to make communication more transparent and effective and make decisions that are based on logic, not emotions or other people’s beliefs.

EBA Management Development Centre team together with Iryna Patlakh invite you to participate in the Online-Development Programme: Anti-Chaos: Critical Thinking for Complex Solutions, which will help you stay in a state of conscious perception of information.

Target audience: everyone who wants to develop critical thinking skills, namely the ability to question information, the ability to think in a disciplined way: clearly, rationally, impartially, based on evidence.

After training, you will be able to:

• Consciously analyze information, identifying its reliability, completeness and possible distortions
• Reasonably participate in professional discussions, using effective argumentation and counterargumentation techniques
• Identify and overcome cognitive biases and avoid logical traps in the process of analysis and decision-making
• Understand the impact of emotions, social roles and group dynamics on the perception of information and decision-making
• Act effectively in conditions of uncertainty, applying probabilistic thinking and decision-making logic
• Make informed decisions, effectively using the DECIDE, OODA-loop and Pre-mortem models in complex situations.

Intro: How do we think? 

• What is (and what is not) critical thinking?
• How to think about your thinking, to “catch yourself” in prejudices or logical traps in time (“Thought about thought”, “Cognitive mirror”)

What helps in the process of critical thinking? 

Checking sources and information hygiene

• Information quality criteria (authoritativeness, relevance, reliability, impartiality, confirmation by other sources). Distinguishing facts from fakes
• Identifying information distortions (generalizations, omissions, distortions, assumptions, guesses, etc.)
• Bonus: a checklist of Socratic questions for clarifying information

Discussion as a tool of thinking

• Differences between argument, discussion and debate
• The “TAIV” argumentation formula. Defining leading arguments and outsider arguments
• Argumentation techniques (“Plus-minus-plus”, “Argumentation development”, etc.) and counterargumentation techniques (“It’s all questionable”, “You contradict yourself”, “Imaginary consequences”, etc.)
• Sophisms and manipulations: how not to fall into the trap of logically false statements Examples: “Against the individual” (Ad hominem), “After that – therefore because of that” (Post hoc), “False dichotomy” (false dilemma), “Appeal to the majority” (ad populum)
• The “Gambling Dispute” game – we practice the skills of argumentation, counterargumentation and recognition of hidden influence in the process of communication

Rationalization of the decision-making process

• How to act in complexity and uncertainty? ✓ DECIDE model ✓ OODA-loop model
• Checking the solution for stability and viability (Pre-mortem technique)
• Workshop: situation analysis and decision-making using selected models

1 and 8 April, 15.00-19.00

What hinders the process of critical thinking?

Cognitive biases

• What are they and why are they not “errors” but a function of the brain?
• Examples: anchor effect, framing, status quo, illusions of truth, endowment effect, fallacy of inaction
• Workshop: cases for recognizing biases, exercise “Step Back” — identifying bias in one’s own conclusions

Paradoxes of thinking

• Probabilistic thinking and the logic of uncertainty. What is the difference between “possible”, “probably”, “almost certainly”?
• Why intuition often fails in complex or non-standard tasks?
• What to do when there is no 100% data, but a decision needs to be made?
• The game “Lamborghini or goat?”
• Reflection: when thinking needs a “restart” and what signals show this?

Selective perception: how emotions, social roles, beliefs, expectations and groupthink affect the critical thinking process

• How emotions, roles, expectations and group dynamics affect information processing
• The halo and horns effect, anecdotal evidence vs. statistics, confirmation bias
• Workshop: Neutrality Check technique

Outro: Gathering experience 

“Alaska Gold Miners: Survival Strategies” is a team simulation that integrates all elements of critical thinking:

• information gathering
• choice of actions and strategies
• argumentation and counterargumentation
• probabilistic thinking
• decision-making under uncertainty
• team dynamics
• analysis of the consequences of strategies

You can send a question to: