Six Serving Men is a team exercise that examines an issue from twelve different viewpoints. It is based on the words of the poem by Rudyard Kipling:
I keep six honest serving men, they taught me all I knew.
Their names are What and Why and When
and How and Where and Who.
We probe the topic using these questioning words from a positive and negative perspective. The issue is defined as a question and then 12 sheets of flip chart paper are arranged around the room. On each sheet one of the 12 questions is written as the heading and the team then comes up with answers to that question. Suppose the issue is, ‘How can we improve customer service in our retail centres?’ The questions could be constructed as follows:
1. What is good customer service?
2. What is not good customer service? (Or what is bad customer service?)
3. Why do we get good customer services?
4. Why do we get bad customer service?
5. When is there good customer service?
6. When is there bad customer service?
7. How do we get good customer service?
8. How do we get bad customer service?
9. Where is there good customer service?
10. Where is there bad customer service?
11. Who gives good customer service?
12. Who gives poor customer service?
By repeatedly approaching the questions of good service and bad service and by forcing people to come up with new answers and inputs a broad picture is painted of the issue and the underlying factors. The ideas on the sheets are analyzed, prioritized and combined to give a deeper understanding of the problem and some insights as to why it is happening. These ideas then become the starting point for a plan to address the issue.
All my brainstorm methods are explained in this book for facilitators. How to Generate Ideas
This is a great technique that has served me well for many years. I also use it to frame report writing to ensure that all aspects have been covered. I am using it as I speak to prepare a Q/A session. I have also encouraged my daughters to use it in essay and report writing.
@BlogHelpHQ This is brilliant and thanks for sharing. I was on the trail of the Six Serving Men and it led me here. Learning to apply those questions in my training sessions will be invaluable
The teaching profession, or those who instruct, coach or mentor have been using Rudyard Kipling’s The Elephant Child as a format for creating and delivering both theoretical and practical lessons for many years.
What you are about to learn.
Why you need to know this.
When you can use this.
How you can use this.
Where you can use this.
Who can use this?
What, Why and When, How and Where and Who don’t necessarily need to be in this order.
They can and should be interwoven to create subheadings under each main lesson/subject/topic heading to allow the teacher to elaborate further and really dig deeper into any given topic and when needing that all important confirmation that the class has been listening.
Military instructors use this very technique in parallel with the 5 P’s of Planning and Preparation Prevents Poor Performance, which i personally used whilst based in Camberley in the ’80’s.
A very simple lesson that anyone can use to practice implementing the What, Why and When, How and Where and Who is to explain and demonstrate – How to Make a Jam Sandwich.
Breaking each stage down becomes much easier when we use What, Why and When, How and Where and Who.
The Elephant’s Child is my favourite story, and I used the poem to help me answer my GCSEs. I am so pleased that this has been recognised and taught as a method for covering all aspects of an exam or any kind of write-up, as it was only by chance that I realised how this would help me. Long Live our 6 Honest Serving Men!
I think this is a situation where we need to define ‘good’ and ‘bad’. For example:
good = will help us to achieve our objectives
bad = will prevent us from achieving our objectives
Was wondering how this could be useful for class four students
I’m 87 yrs old & have known Kipling’s “servers” ever since my childhood in India. Each Managed Unit (MU) has servers; as a mgmt. consultant I’ve organized them. The MU consults WHY (purpose) 1st, WHERE (authority) 2nd & WHAT (goal) 3rd. These first three servers define the MU’s STRATEGY. Then the MU consults WHO (people) 4th, WHEN (sequence) 5th &, lastly HOW (method). These second three servers define the MU’s TACTICS. Yes: all the MUs must consult all 6 servers & must “dovetail” its STRATEGY with its superior’s TACTICS. Btw, traditional mgmt. (TM) is all about STRATEGY; quality mgmt. (QM) is all about TACTICS: this is why so many org’ns have difficulty with understanding quality.
Thank you to the content writer of the site. A thank you is extended to
each of the other commentators as well. Between these two sources much
knowledge which can be applied deftly is gained here.
It is to wonder at how crafty Mr. Kipling was to write his poem, and
have it convey timeless knowledge. Excuse me, need to be, …
I use the six serving men in my email signature. I inform colleagues that I will be using the six serving men approach to ask questions about project work activities and to define the project plan. As a project manager I ask a lot of questions and use serving men to help me cover all the items I need to manage people, process and technology.
Thank you all for your inputs. Life changing information.
All of the adults here who are correctly pointing out how and why to use the six serving men in business, teaching, etc are correct.
But they are missing part of the point, and all of the fun. Who did kipling write this poem and story for? Why did he write them? What point was he trying to make and to whom? Hint: Rudyard Kipling wrote the Just So stories for his children. As any parent of a small child can tell you, children delight in overusing the six serving men, for the purpose of getting an adult to admit that there are questions that the adult does not know the answers to. Children ask the question Why? Immediately after the adult answers any previous question. They repeat this endlessly, until the adult gives up, huffs off in frustration, or falls back on a non-answer like “because”. The child wins every time. This is both endearing, and frustrating for the adult. Kipling obviously directed that frustration, and love, into the poem and story, as well as pointing out in the poem that the six serving men can be overused. He also points out in The Elephants Child that curriosity should not be punished.