Critical Thinking and Quality by Design are two different concepts that, when bridged together, can potentially create the opportunity to improve processes, optimize efficiencies, reduce issues, while promoting better assessments of risk, which may overall yield better results with validation, manufacturing processes, quality systems and technology implementation.
Critical thinking, by definition, is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, to aid us in determining our path forward. Information is digested by taking into account prior and existing experience, background, and identified risks and using this historical knowledge to move forward utilizing better planned, more efficient, and demonstrated processes to yield improved outcomes.
In essence, critical thinking is a type of thinking in which the thinker improves the quality of his or her thinking by skillfully taking charge of the structures inherent in thinking and imposing intellectual standards upon them.