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4 Ways to Change Behaviour

26 December, 2013 by James Lawther 11 Comments

There are 4 ways to change people’s behaviour: The first is the stick: Beat people until they do what you want. The stick works, but people hate being controlled, they will rebel — sooner or later.  Repression is not a great strategy. The second is the carrot: Provide an incentive.  Incentives work beautifully, until you remove […]

Filed Under: Blog, Employee Engagement, Tools & Techniques Tagged With: conformity, customer behaviour, group think, human nature, incentives, motivation, political will, reinforcing behaviour, video

Scientific Proof – Politicians are Stupid

17 November, 2013 by James Lawther 14 Comments

politicians are stupid

The power of belief Have you ever wondered why people hold onto their beliefs despite statistical proof that they are wrong? Is it that we don’t understand what the numbers are telling us? Or is it that we just chose to ignore them? Dan Kahan is the professor of Law and Politics at Yale University. […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: assumptions, beliefs, clarity, data is not information, human nature, statistics, video

Form Follows Function

16 October, 2013 by James Lawther 2 Comments

This is not new news Fire engines look the way they do so they can put out fires The London Underground looks the way it does so it can transport people Crocodiles look the way they do… (maybe now I am labouring the point) If you know your function then your form will follow. So far […]

Filed Under: Blog, Process Improvement Tagged With: form follows function, purpose, service design, video

How do you Make a Pencil?

27 August, 2013 by James Lawther 5 Comments

In 1958 Leonard E Read wrote an essay about making pencils. He described: The growing of trees The work of a lumberjack The operation of the saw mill The making of the saw The transportation of the logs The mining of the graphite The production of the rubber The mixing of the paint The sourcing […]

Filed Under: Blog, Process Improvement Tagged With: ignorance, learning, management by wandering around, management style, systems thinking, video

Are Tall People Better Managers?

20 August, 2013 by James Lawther 5 Comments

We all have biases; things that we believe are true, that drive our decisions and actions. But those biases can be blind spots, so they may drive the wrong decisions and actions. The worst thing about biases is that we don’t realise that we have them, they are part of who we are.  As the old […]

Filed Under: Blog, Operations Analysis Tagged With: assumptions, beliefs, video, what don't you see

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