About
A.S. Prasad
Founder, Critical Thinking Academy
A.S. Prasad founded the Critical Thinking Academy in 2013 to develop critical thinking skills among executives and students. Since then he has trained over 4,000 executives and professionals, including at Amazon, McCormick (USA), HCL, and GE Healthcare, and students at institutions including IIM Indore, IIM Vizag, IIM Nagpur, IIM Rohtak, IMT Ghaziabad, and NIFT.
He is the lead author of Critical and Analytical Thinking (Cengage, 2024), a comprehensive textbook presenting the holistic critical thinking framework, co-authored with Prof. Shailja Agarwal of IMT Ghaziabad. He is also the author of The Hidden Traps of Persuasion (2023), on cognitive biases, logical fallacies, and rhetorical manipulation, and of Critical Thinking for Watson-Glaser (2026) and the Critical Thinking Field Guide (2026).
Background
A.S. Prasad is a management graduate from IIM Ahmedabad (1981-83). Before founding the Critical Thinking Academy, he spent three decades in marketing and senior management across industries, including Disney character franchising, FMCG, software distribution, and IT services.
That experience shapes his teaching. Every concept is grounded in real business situations, the kinds of decisions and problems managers actually face, drawing on cases from direct experience and from the Harvard case library.
He also teaches Digital Marketing for B2B at IIM Indore and other institutions.
The approach
Most critical thinking programmes focus on a single element: biases, or fallacies, or frameworks, or communication. This approach differs by integrating all the elements into one system, built on three pillars. The three-pillar model and the CCTF were developed through teaching over 4,000 executives and professionals since 2013, and refined against the problems and decisions that professionals bring to the classroom.
Pillar One
Logical reasoning
The core reasoning skills: deductive, inductive, causal, and moral reasoning, and evaluating credibility.
Pillar Two
The CCTF
The Comprehensive Critical Thinking Framework, providing structured approaches to problem-solving and decision-making, step by step, so that no important element is missed.
Pillar Three
Barriers to critical thinking
Cognitive biases, logical fallacies, rhetorical devices, linguistic barriers, and statistical barriers, each of which distorts thinking regardless of how sound the underlying reasoning is.
The framework provides the process. The reasoning skills and barrier-awareness ensure the quality of thinking at every step. Remove any one pillar and the structure collapses.
Organisations
Corporate
Amazon, McCormick (USA), HCL, GE Healthcare, EPAM India, Zinnov Consulting, Molex India, Bharat Electronics, Saankhya Labs, Radisys, YUJ Designs.
Educational Institutions
IIM Indore, IIM Vizag, IIM Nagpur, IIM Rohtak, IMT Ghaziabad, NIFT Bangalore, IBS Hyderabad, JAGSOM Bangalore, GLA University, Chandigarh University, Amrita University, PSG College of Arts & Sciences, JIPMER Puducherry, Bhowanipur Educational Society College Kolkata.
Defence
Defence Services Staff College (DSSC) Wellington, Naval War College Goa.
Get in touch
Critical Thinking Field Guide
Comprehensive. No fluff, no long stories. Written for the working professional.
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