I have been primarily interested in how and why ordinary people do unusual things, things that seem alien to their natures. Why do good people sometimes act evil? Why do smart people sometimes do dumb or irrational things? – Philip Zimbardo.
During a discussion with leaders of a family business on launching a new brand, they said, “we want the video to make people irrational, it should defy logic. That is the real win.”
On my drive back, I thought about how people make decisions in life – be it to buy a product or to choose a life partner.
We make ourselves believe that the information required to take the decision is already been acquired and analyzed rationally. But human beings are predictably irrational, as Dan Ariely puts it. Emotions overrule logic.
Impulse dominates analysis. Reaction first than thinking first.
As Stephen Covey says, there is a space between stimuli and response we hardly use.
3 things which can help to put things in perspective
Sweet spot: The right conditions for your decision to work well for you. It is a particular context in which the decision is a sure shot winner. The changes in context will change its equation.
Blind spot: We do not know what we do not know. We are not able to see certain things which require visibility to take a decision. Reducing ambiguity is important. Like minimizing risks.
Weak spot: The fact that we know we are not good at analyzing certain things because we are emotional about it.
Disclaimer: Even after all doing these, we still remain predictably irrational. The only thing we can do is to reduce it a bit.