TED 2009: Predict Sessions
Nate Silver - what we can predict we can design to influence. Examples from the U.S. election
Alex Tabarrok - the theme of this one seemed to be ‘all is not lost’. While the world is currently in financial turmoil we are in a unique position in history because at the start of the 21st Century growth extended to almost all parts of the world.
New ideas drive growth and larger markets save lives as they increase the incentive to product new ideas. One world market gives us many more idea creators.
Bruce BuenodeMesquita -this talk was all about using game theory to predict how people behave. He gave us predictions for Iran but his insights are applicable to much more than just politics.
Game theory is based on the assumptions that:
- People are rationally self-interested
- People have values and beliefs
- People face limitations
When we are trying to understand and predict decisions we make a mistake if we just pay attention to the person at the top of the power ladder. There are lots of people shaping decisions.
In order to make predictions we need to ask the following questions:
- Who has a stake in the decision?
- What do they say they want?
- What priority does the issue have for them - how are they on this issue compared to other issues?
- How much influence could they bring to bear.
In making decisions we all care about two things: the outcome and the credit for the outcome. Different people trade these off in different quantities.
Choices, changes, values and beliefs are all we need to know to predict a person’s actions. When this analysis is created across all influencers in a particular problem them the outcome of most complicated negotiations is predictable. Situations can then be engineered to get a better result.
I think there are fascinating implications for change management and influence in this paper….especially the information about the particular things to focus on when trying to understand someone elses motivation.
Dan Ariely had several fascinating anecdotes…so much so that I stopped taking notes so my comment on this paper is brief. I have bought his book though and am very much looking forward to reading it. The main takeaway for me is the reinforcement of ’social proof’. Social proof is a term coined by Robert Cialdini in his seminal book ‘Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion’ and relates to the fact that we are much more likely to do the things that our peer group is doing, Dan Ariely demonstrated this with reference to cheating showing that cheating rose or dropped significantly if a group had clear, visible social proof that this was the norm among their peers.
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