Human behaviour, motivation, and psychology
No matter what tools, methods, or approaches you take to create a change, time, care, and attention ultimately affect the outcome as much as anything else. When people ask about what is the one thing that most influence change efforts I offer not one, but three: time, care, and attention. Many things affect intentional change, …
The Three Variables Underlying Every Significant Change Project Read More »
We are trained to use our powers of evidence and research to make our point. What if we used much less research to make much more of a point? When I get into a debate or look to persuade something, my natural tendency is to gather and align as much evidence as I can to …
Nicholas Thompson’s regular posts on The Most Interesting Thing in Tech are informative, timely and enjoyable. However, sometimes the most interesting thing isn’t the tech, but the humans around it. Generative AI is everywhere and has an enormous impact on the arts. Recently, Canadian electronic superstar artist Grimes announced that she is willing to work …
We can think of organizations as part of systems or ecologies, but what does it mean to make them fit for humans? Today, we look at the psychology and design of organizations for humans. An organization is much more than a group of people working together; it’s a system. The whole — the organization — …
Humans and their Organizations: A Psychological Design Perspective Read More »
Psychological momentum leverages performance, motivation, attention, and confidence for sustained change. Harnessing it and leveraging it effectively is a way to improve outcomes. and impact. If you’ve ever seen a team on a hot streak, you know about the power of momentum. Psychological momentum takes the idea first formed in physics and applies it to …
Psychological Momentum and Sustained Performance Read More »
Futures work is a branch of design that seeks to translate trends, ideas, and imagination based on data into visions of where we might go. What happens when we bring psychologists along? The popular deployment of generative AI tools has put ‘futures thinking’ into our collective imagination front and centre. We humans love futures thinking …
The finger-pointing to the moon is a model, not a truth. What happens when our models and frameworks become held as truths instead of guides? There’s an often rephrased Zen quote attributed to the Buddha that says: Do not confuse the finger pointing to the moon for the moon itself. Zen Phrase Often our models, …
I might be writing this near the holidays in 2022, but the message I want to send is timeless. In times of disruption — which seems to be all the time — these are the lessons that my clients, friends, and family did best when they were heeded. They certainly worked for me. I love …
Four Holiday R’s: Rest, Reflection, Recovery, Reinvigorate Read More »
We can reflect on gender-based violence and the victims of it and take action, but we must do both if we want change. Today is a day of National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women in Canada. (You can read more about it here). This is a theme that’s rarely — if …
Remembrance and Action for Gender-Based Violence (And All of Us) Read More »
A myth of behaviour change is that we must be motivated before we act. Behavioural Activation shows us how doing can lead to new thinking and better change-making. Much of the literature on behaviour is predicated on the belief that we need to change our minds to change our behaviour. However, if you’re depressed, anxious, …
