The concept of the “ladder of inference” was originally articulated by Chris Argyris but was brought to the mainstream in 1994 with the “5th Discipline Fieldbook” written by Peter Senge. The concept has become one of the most effective tools in understanding and explaining why we so often get into conflict and fail to get resolution. It is a logical representation of the natural process of decision making used by humans. Please excuse my butchery, but the logical flow is as such: