More Irrational Behavior

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTITIONER

Title: Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior

Competencies: marketing, sales, customer service, communication skills, judgment, decision-making, performance management, self-development

Who benefits: this book has a general appeal

Consultant Usage: excellent background for career counselors, financial consultants, executive coaches

What’s it about? This is the last book on my summer reading list.  Like the other three reviewed here in the past few months, it is about how we go about making decisions.  It is about how we pay lip service to rational decision making, and then make judgments and decisions that are anything but rational. 

On a personal note, these books have been like comfort food (without the weight gain).  I have been drawn to them for a reason I don’t yet completely understand.  Part of it is a frustration I have with some people around me and what I read and watch in the media that defies anything rational.  (e.g., there is a guy I know who has filed for bankruptcy several  times and when I am around him all he wants to talk about how the federal government has it all wrong with its economic policies.  How can he become a fiscal expert when he can’t balance his own checkbook?  There is something irrational going on.)

Of course maybe these books are mirrors for me to personally reflect upon.  I am certainly a big fan of introspection.  This book and the others I have read this summer have certainly given me a lot to think about.

Perhaps that should be my lead into reviewing this book.  It will give you a lot to think about.  It is a very short book. I read it in less than 4 hours with no difficultly.  It is well written with a nice blend of unusual and important topics, research supporting the conclusions of the book, and extremely interesting stories. 

Having said that, it has been very difficult for me to break this book into an easy to read description.   I can say the book is loosely constructed around four main ideas: diagnosis bias, loss aversion, value attribution, and commitment and how these factors move us toward or away from the decisions we make.  And none of these factors are rational.  But trying to summarize them seems too much for this simple Blog.

So let me tease you instead by saying that those four factors will explain such a potpourri of topics as:

• Why in the 1950’s doctors performing open-heart surgery would pour asbestos into the open heart,
• Why NASA sent the ill-fated Challenger into space knowing there was a problem with the O-rings,
• Why the reduction of a few cents on the price of eggs cause a small increase in the purchase of eggs while a similar rise of a few cents causes a large decrease in the purchase of eggs,
• Why a senior pilot who also was the man in charge of the KLM Airlines safety program single handedly caused possibly the worst airplane disaster in history,
• Why consumers will take flat rate subscriptions even if it means more money,
• Why no one paid any attention to Joshua Bell giving a free performance in a Washington D.C. subway plaza using a $3.5 million dollar Stradivarius violin,
• For those of you in HR, why face-to-face employment interviews may be worse than a waste of time,
• Why the Pygmalion effect still works,
• Why money doesn’t motivate (okay, you are a modern person, you already knew that one)
• For those of you in sales and marketing, why we put our trust in the good hands of a Gecko and a Duck
• And finally, for you Sports fans, why the Portland Trailblazers passed over Michael Jordan and two other future hall-of-fame players for a very average player with a short career.

These are just some of the stories that make this book attractive.  The insights you can gain from these tales can have wide application in the work world.  I recommend this book with enthusiasm.

Catch you later. 

[tags]Pygmalion, irrational behavior, loss aversion, value attribution, consumer behavior, behavioral economics, bill bradley, william bradley, bradley[/tags]

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.