In the physical world, beyond a certain point, speed becomes perilous and destructive. One crazy driver can wreak havoc. The greater the speed, the worse the crash. Thus, much of our road infrastructure is concerned with managing speed. We have created a digital world where so mu … | Continue reading
In the physical world, beyond a certain point, speed becomes perilous and destructive. One crazy driver can wreak havoc. The greater the speed, the worse the crash. Thus, much of our road infrastructure is concerned with managing speed. We have created a digital world where so mu … | Continue reading
I have been using Survey Monkey software for more than ten years. Over that time I have seen it become more and more cumbersome and complicated. I used to be able to put surveys together without thinking. It was so simple and smooth. I have a lot of colleagues who have used Surve … | Continue reading
In 2014, we completed our largest ever Top Tasks identification project for the European Union. It was in 28 countries and 24 languages. Almost 107,000 voted. After 30 voters, the top three tasks had emerged. Yes, the top three tasks after we closed the survey with 106,792 voters … | Continue reading
Data is not fact and fact is often just a hypothesis anyway. We humans design how data is created and we humans are the ones who interpret data and draw conclusions from it. Therefore, data will always be inherently fallible. Unless we approach it with a sense of humility and a w … | Continue reading
Let’s say you’re trying to deliver an excellent customer experience for a health website or app. You start by truly knowing your audience. Let’s say, for example, that you have statistically reliable data that tells you that mental wellbeing, which includes stress reduction, mind … | Continue reading
Low information people tend to be highly emotional, impulsive and habitual. They hero worship. They blindly trust their instincts and fiercely distrust everything and everyone else. Much traditional marketing and advertising was designed to pull the emotional triggers of low info … | Continue reading
People tend to avoid feeling empathy because it requires too much mental effort, according to a study published by researchers at Penn State University and the University of Toronto, in June 2019. “Across all of the experiments, participants on average chose the empathy scenario … | Continue reading
As the Web matures, we search less for our top tasks, and we search more for our tiny tasks. When you move to a new city, you’re going to do a lot of searching. You’re going to search for supermarkets, local shops, local cafes and restaurants. The longer you live in the city, the … | Continue reading
Shortlisting is the process of moving from a long list of often poorly worded statements to a clear list of tasks that might matter to people in a decision-making environment (buying a car, choosing a university, using a piece of software, etc.) Typically, it takes about three we … | Continue reading
Did you hear the joke about the Danish medical system for the amputation of legs? It gives you two choices. To amputate the “left” leg or to amputate the “correct” leg. Actually, it’s not a joke. It’s an actual IT system installed by Epic Systems (what a name!). The Epic health … | Continue reading
Anything that focuses on customers is heading in the right direction. Jeff Sauro calls the Net Promoter Score (NPS) “a reasonable proxy for historical or current revenue in some industries and potentially for future revenue and likely self-reported customer retention”. Conversely … | Continue reading
“So we want to better organize our content,” the manager told me one day. “Get rid of all the old and irrelevant stuff and rewrite what’s important in more customer-centric language.” Everything sounded good so far. “We want to simplify the navigation and really improve the searc … | Continue reading
A friend of mine was waiting in a long queue in a small Irish town to get money out of a bank machine. It was a big queue. When he got inside he saw four machines, but only one of them allowed him to take money out. Three of them were exclusively for lodging money… Read More » | Continue reading
“More than two-thirds of employees around the world say they have to consult with more than one boss to get their jobs done,” The Wall Street Journal quoted a Gartner report in 2018. Nearly the same waste significant time waiting for guidance from senior leaders. Buurtzorg, a Dut … | Continue reading
A constant stream of unfiltered customer comments fill large screens placed in busy areas of the Fidelity International offices in London. Close by are white screens and markers and chairs and tables. Staff will regularly be found congregating around the screens, discussing what … | Continue reading
According to “The Cost of Music,” a joint study penned by the University of Glasgow and the University of Oslo, greenhouse gases were recorded at 140-million kilograms in 1977 for music production activities (vinyl; plastic packaging). Moreover, they were at 136 million kilograms … | Continue reading
Which delivers betters results? A highly competitive environment or a highly collaborative one? There are some signs that in our highly complex world, collaboration is currently winning. Microsoft was a company that was hyper-competitive, both externally and internally. The strat … | Continue reading
Simplicity comes at a cost. If you look at societies wherein everything is made incredibly simple, easy and luxurious for a certain class, you are nearly always looking at a slave or a slave-like economy. The maids who look after rich people’s children cannot be at their own home … | Continue reading
What good is the Internet? No, really—what good is it? Is society better because of it? Are people healthier, wealthier, or even happier? According to the OECD, the middle class is now a part of the global species extinction phenomenon. Other reports show that the data centers th … | Continue reading
“Networks are an essential ingredient in any complex adaptive system,” Eric Beinhocker writes in The Origin of Wealth. “Without interactions between agents, there can be no complexity.” Think of a printed page in a book for a moment. It may contain complex ideas, but it is relati … | Continue reading
“Yes, there is local pride. Of course there’s local pride. You’d be a fool to argue that local pride isn’t essential,” Paul Rouse states in a documentary about the Irish game of hurling. “But it’s not just local pride,” Rouse continues. “It’s about winning and it has always been … | Continue reading
As is the case in many countries, in Australia too, there is a banking crisis. The primary cause for this crisis, like other places, is the greed of senior management. The money that senior managers have managed to amass has ballooned over the last forty years, not because these … | Continue reading
Humans love answers. If certainty is heaven for most people, then randomness is hell. However, as complexity increases, so do uncertainty and randomness. One of the best ways to deal with complexity is with humility. In our complex world, we’re bound to be more wrong than right. … | Continue reading
At one level, the Web facilitates diversity. At another, it encourages uniformity. Paradox and contradiction seem to be the hallmarks of complex, interconnected systems. In politics, the Web has allowed those of similar views to flock together. The center struggles as the wings a … | Continue reading
“Someday soon, every place and thing in the real world—every street, lamppost, building, and room—will have its full-size digital twin in the mirrorworld,” Kevin Kelly writes for Wired magazine. It maybe so. However, we also need a mirrorworld that goes the other way: one that re … | Continue reading
We can understand the notion of luxury in the physical world. But what is digital luxury? What does a luxurious interface mean? And, what is a luxurious digital experience? Recently, we’ve been doing some work for Toyota Lexus, and I was asked to present a talk to a group of mana … | Continue reading
Recently, I had the opportunity to deal with a government agency that was reviewing its digital strategy. Like many government entities, the organization functioned as a monopoly. However, during our engagement, an executive pointed out that they couldn’t be complacent because FA … | Continue reading