HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER
Competencies: self-development (primary); decision making and judgment (secondary)
Who benefits: anyone who finds the topic of interest
Consultant Usage: good background material for coaches; could be incorporated into training programs
What’s it about? Did you immediately form an impression about me when you saw the error in today’s title for this posting? Did words like “stupid†or “idiot†pass through your mind? Did you have a strong desire to immediately go to the comments section and write me a “constructive message� If your answer is yes to any of these questions, then you may be a good candidate for reading this book. First impressions, ego, not seeing the big picture, not seeing the details are just a few of the predispositions we have to making errors.
The first half of the first paragraph hooked me. “There are all kinds of mistakes. There’s real estate you should have bought and people you shouldn’t have married. There’s the stock that tanked….â€Â Hooboy, I can relate! The author is three for three with me.
Journalist/author Hallinan has written a delightful book filled with wonderful stories about why we make mistakes. But be forewarned, the book can be humbling. (It took me two guesses to pick the correct US penny [among 16 choices]…which I have seen thousands of times but apparently never looked at it. I won’t tell you how poorly I did on some of the other exercises!) Â
You will learn all about your unconscious biases that lead you to make mistakes. You will also learn why you are likely to repeat your mistakes. (If you have ever locked your keys in your car or in your house, despite your oaths to never, ever do that again…you probably did – or will do so in the near future.)
You will learn that “(m)emory, it turns out, is often more reconstruction than a reproductionâ€. And that plays a key role in why we make mistakes.
For me, perhaps not overly important in the greater scheme of things, I did learn how to better organize beer in the fridge. That alone made the book worth the read!
I found something to love in each chapter of this marvelous book, but let me close with three of my favorite chapter headings:
1. We Look But Don’t Always See
2. We Can Walk and Chew Gum – But Not Much Else
3. We All Think We’re Above Average.
It would be a mistake not to read this book. Catch you later.
[tags]mistakes, errors, to err is human, predisposition, first impressions, walk and chew gum, mistake prone, memory, unconscious bias, memory as reconstruction, 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.
