Applying the laws of human behaviour in your teams
Aline Holzwarth, Principal of the wonderfully named Centre for Advanced Hindsight at Duke University, published an article on behavioraleconomics.com that presented three laws of human behaviour. You may want to think of them as principles rather than laws. Either way, they are very helpful to keep in mind working with teams.
Three laws of human behaviour worth keeping in mind for our teams. Image: behavioraleconomics.com
Law 1 - Behaviour tends to follow the status quo unless it is acted upon by a decrease in friction or increase in fuel
This is basically about behavioural inertia. We will continue to do what we have done until something makes another behaviour more appealing. That can be made appealing because we are more motivated or because the behaviour has become easier. This is directly applicable in our teams. In general, it seems easier to shift the environment than someone else’s motivation. When we want to encourage certain behaviours from people, we can think about how to make those behaviours easier to achieve.
It leads nicely into Law 2.
Law 2 - Behaviour is a function of the person and their environment
The second law is a good reminder for our team in a couple of ways. When people are not performing in the way that we would like them to, we often assume it is because of something that they are responsible for - perhaps their lack of skill, motivation, discipline or organisation. This principle of human behaviour doesn’t exclude that as a factor but also asks us to consider what influence the environment that they are in has upon their performance. Similarly, when we are seeing a performance that is above our expectations, we can often overemphasise the role of the individual in that and underestimate the role that the environment - the resources, organisational support or other team members. The second law helps remind us that things with people are rarely that simple - and to look at the whole system of the person and their context.
Law 3 - For every decision made, there are tradeoffs and the potential for unintended consequences
The third (and probably most uncomfortable) of the laws of human behaviour. This speaks directly to complexity. In complex systems, we simply cannot know all of the possible implications of our decisions. We also can’t expect to keep all of our options on the table.
Even as a high school student, I remember saying this phrase… “You always make the right decision - based on the information available at the time and your interpretation of that information.” This seems applicable as a reminder of Law 3. The ability of our teams to make - and accept - that we are required to make decisions with incomplete information that could lead to things we haven’t considered doesn’t make us hopeless. It makes us human. What is best is to be able to acknowledge when this is happening and improve our decisions as we get better information or our interpretation of that information changes.
Here are some questions for you to consider this week with your teams:
How can you help shift the status quo in your team?
Are you paying enough attention to both the people and the environment in your team's performance?
Can your team identify and deal with the tradeoffs of the decisions that they make?