Unstereotype 4 me

Given that innovators are predominantly men from privileged backgrounds…Researchers imply that the gains from innovation are directed at the same customer group…Men from privileged backgrounds!

Does it mean that there are many underserved markets?

Not necessarily. Let me explain: An innovator increases the chances to create products that meet the needs of a broad group instead of his' or hers’ when the said innovator mingles with people from a different group.

So, fellow entrepreneurs, Men and Women: Hang out with a diverse crowd of people to reach out to a broad customer base and increase your chances of success!!

Source: Source: “Social Push and the Direction of Innovation,” published in 2020
by
* Elias Einio, VATT Institute for Economic Research
* Josh Feng, University of Utah – Eccles School of Business
* Xavier Jaravel, London School of Economics

Most of us think of conflict as negative and go to great lengths to avoid it.

But much research finds the opposite: Disagreement, when managed well, gets more significant results than avoidance does.

It can spur better ideas, creativity, and innovation, helping businesses gain competitive knowledge.

Part of the reason we expect disagreement to lead to disaster is that we assume the people on the other side won’t listen with an open mind. We often rely on stereotypes, convincing ourselves that their positions are extreme caricatures of what they are.

It is called False Polarisation!

SOLUTIONS:
1. Realize that disagreement probably won’t feel as bad as you think

2. Direct your disagreement toward the work, not the person:
* Focus on learning, be curious about others’ perspectives
* Pick your words carefully: use words like sometimes to soften your assertion of knowledge of other perspectives, reframe your ideas in positive term

But in reality, each of us tend to focus no the facts that support our beliefs and dismiss or devalue those that don’t.

Human minds have a hard time processing contradictory information but easily make connections to familiar ideas.

That’s not because of insecurity or ago threat; It’s simply a limitation of our processing capability!!!

Overtime our views crystallize around a set of familiar ideas supported by members of our professional networks, news we follow, the leaders we admire, and the politicians we support.

We overlook or forget evidence that backs up opposing perspectives because we encounter it less frequently and it doesn’t jibe with our mental pictures.

People on both sides of a disagreement may be equally informed but with different information.

SOLUTION: Focus on learning, Be curious about others’ perspectives: ask questions, and try to understand the opposing opinions!

Imagine yourself pitching an idea to a group of people:
As you speak, you quickly scan the audience, your attention jumping from face to face. Are people smiling? Or do they look confused, bored, maybe even angry?

Researchers have found that speakers’ attention is naturally drawn more to faces expressing negative emotions than to faces conveying positive ones.

A recent Harvard study found that this effect holds for groups as well as for individuals.

So next time you pitch an idea, give a talk, or even just enter a room and start getting a sense of the atmosphere, try actively looking at everyone, rather than letting your focus get drawn to just one or two highly emotional faces - Health masks should help on this one!

While it won’t completely eradicate your natural attention biases, it should leave you with a more accurate estimation of how your audience really feels.

Photo credit: Benetton
Source: Harvard Researchers: Amit Goldenberg and Erika Weisz
Study: “The Crowd Emotion Amplification Effect”
Released in 2020

Do you consider yourself as an optimist in life? Are your expectations usually greater than our objective outcomes?

You experience the optimism bias!!!

This bias has been shown to falsely inflate people’s expected job achievements and underestimate risks about getting cancer.

Put differently, the optimism bias is causing people to both overestimate the likelihood of positive events and underestimate the likelihood of negative events.

Which is good in some context but can play out badly in other context…don’t you think?

Photo crédit: Jean-Paul Goude

Other characteristics of Hubris include excessive confidence in one’s judgment, a messianic manner of talking, and a disproportionate concern with image and presentation...

Tell us in your own way how you feel about this

Source: Towards an organizational theory of hubris: Symptoms, behaviors and social fields within finance and banking by Dennis Tourish, Published February 21, 2019

Other characteristics of Hubris include excessive confidence in one’s judgment, a messianic manner of talking, and a disproportionate concern with image and presentation...

Tell us in your own way how you feel about this!

Source: Towards an organisational theory of hubris: Symptoms, behaviours and social fields within finance and banking by Dennis Tourish, Published February 21, 2019

LET IT GO!!

Source: Thich Nhat Hanh

Even 45 minutes of exposure to a different culture can boost creativity: When a group of American students was shown a slideshow about China as opposed to one about the United States, their scores on several creativity tests went up.

In companies, the people who interface with multiple different units tend to be greater sources of innovation than people who interface only with their own.

While nobody knows for certain what causes this effect, it’s likely that foreign ideas help us break open our categories.

Is that something you have noticed?

The publication is a sum-up of the study “Minority Influence, Divergent Thinking and Detection of Correct Solutions” published by Psychologists Charlan Nemeth and Julianne Kwan in July 2006 in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology

Research showed that the illusory truth effect likely played a role in people’s acceptance of false stories on social media!

The illusory truth effect was first discussed in a 1977 paper by Lynn Hasher, David Goldstein, and Thomas Toppino. Their work was the first to demonstrate the power of repetition on belief.

Interest in the illusory truth effect grew in the late 2000s and 2010s, as the internet and social media became more and more important for disseminating information.
It became a particularly popular research topic after the 2016 US Presidential election, when questions were swirling about the influence of foreign disinformation campaigns.

This publication is a summary of the study “Frequency and the Conference of Referential Validity”published in February 1977 by Lynn Hasher, D. Goldstein, Thomas Toppino from the University of Toronto

It’s been nearly 40 years since the first study on the “Not Invented Here” syndrome was conducted, but NIH Syndrome continues to stunt innovation in every industry !

NIH exists in many ways and on different levels.

For example, on the country level, we see some governments refused to adopt foreign countries’ successful experience in coping with the Covid-19.

On the organization level, we see NIH is reflected in Nokia’s and Kodak’s reluctance in addressing the rise of new technology which was derived externally.

NIH also exists on the team level as mentioned earlier and on the individual level

The content is a sum up of the
- Katz, R., & Allen, T. J. (1982). Investigating the Not Invented Here (NIH) syndrome: A look at the performance, tenure, and communication patterns of 50 R & D Project Groups
- Chanamolu.S; Hanayneh.S; Misiewicz.L; Mohammed.M; and Nayame.J, (2017) Dilemmas in Not Invented Here Syndrome".
- Antons, D., & Piller, F. T. (2015). Opening the black box of “Not Invented Here”: Attitudes, decision biases, and behavioral consequences.

Ending with positive statements creates better learning assessments, medical patients would rather endure longer uncomfortable procedures than shorter painful procedures!

By being aware of the peak-end rule and using it to our advantage, we can significantly improve our well-being and happiness by viewing more and more of our memories as positive experiences.

The Peak-end theory was created by the Nobel Prize-winning Israeli psychologist Daniel Kahneman.
This post is a summary of his studies, the first of which was released in the 1993 paper “When More Pain Is Preferred to Less: Adding a Better End”.

Tell us in your own way how do you feel about this!