Look Closely at the Outliers in Your Data

Kellogg Insight has written an article about the research conducted by Joel Shapiro, Clinical Associate Professor and Executive Director for the Program on Data Analytics.   Shapiro has some terrific advice for data scientists attempting to discover opportunities for improving the customer experience.  He recommends avoiding the usual practice of "scrubbing the data" of outliers.  Instead, he advocates mining those outliers for interesting insights about consumer needs and pain points.  Here's an excerpt from the article: 

“The mere presence of outliers in customer experience data means that really good or bad things can happen to customers,” says Shapiro. “Maybe you can move that [experience] toward something that either increases the number of positive experiences or doesn’t detract from them.”  When data scientists come across an outlier, their first inclination may be to discard it in favor of “cleaning” or “smoothing out” the data. After all, the data might have been entered incorrectly or appear as the result of a modeling error. Or it may represent a freak accident—a set of circumstances unlikely to replicate itself. Why waste time accounting for the easily discountable?  Resist that urge, Shapiro says. It is always worth examining why the outlier occurred.

Shapiro's point actually connects quite well with a technique employed by design thinking experts as they conduct qualitative/ethnographic research.   Design thinkers do not simply interview and observe "average/typical users."  They look for "extreme users" - people who out of the mainstream.  Perhaps, if you were studying a project on grocery stores, you might study someone who buys fresh food daily at the store, and prepares home-cooked meals for his or her large family each day.   At the same time, you might study a few individuals who never cook for themselves, and how rarely buy food at the grocery store because they eat out on a regular basis.   In the end, you are not designing a new product or service for these extreme users.  Instead, you are using these extreme users/outliers to gain insight and inspiration.  

Taking a Break Stimulates Creativity: More Evidence

Source: Alfred Wordsworth Thompson (Wikimedia Commons)

In Unlocking Creativity, I write about how achieving some psychological distance from a problem can enhance our ability to develop creative solutions to perplexing problems. In its simplest form, we often think about the value of taking a break or going for a walk. Perhaps more interestingly, research shows that there are other ways to foster psychological distance, and thereby enhance creativity. One can role play, walk a mile in someone else's shoes, imagine a situation several months or years in the future, or leverage travel experiences as a means of enhancing psychological distance.

A recent study confirms the value of simply taking a break or going for a walk. The study demonstrates that creativity often benefits from an "incubation period." Steven Kachelmeier, Laura Wang, and Michael Williamson have written a paper titled, "Incentivizing the Creative Process: From Initial Quantity to Eventual Creativity." They examined the impact that incentives can have on the number of creative ideas that people generate. The scholars found that incentives did not generate a benefit initially, but incentives helped if people had an opportunity to take a break during the task. Kachelmeier told Science Daily, "You need to rest, take a break and detach yourself -- even if that detachment is just 20 minutes. The recipe for creativity is try -- and get frustrated because it's not going to happen. Relax, sit back, and then it happens."

Teach Experts to Think Differently

Source: Wikimedia

I've written an article for Training Magazine, published this past week.  It is titled, "Teach Experts to Think Differently."  You can view the article here.  Hope you find the ideas useful, particularly if learning and talent development are areas of responsibility for you. 

Should Leaders Show Vulnerability?

Source:  Pixabay

Inc. magazine ran a headline this week that said, "Showing Vulnerability at Work Can Hurt You If You're the Boss, Science Finds." Frankly, the headline alarmed me quite a bit.  I've always believed that leaders who demonstrate some vulnerability at times can foster psychological safety, and thereby enhance learning and problem-solving efficacy in teams.  

I decided to dig deeper. The article cites a study by Kerry Roberts Gibsona, Dana Hararib, and Jennifer Carson Marr. Thearticle is titled, "When sharing hurts: How and why self-disclosing weakness undermines the task-oriented relationships of higher status disclosers." What do these researchers find? Based on a series of experimental studies, with undergraduate students as research subjects, they concluded: 

In three laboratory experiments, we found that when higher status individuals self-disclosed a weakness, it led to lower influence (Studies 1, 2 and 3), greater perceived conflict (Studies 1, 2 and 3), less liking (Study 1), and less desire for a future relationship (Studies 2 and 3) by attenuating the status of the discloser. 

The findings appear robust, but I wonder about the limitations of the study.   For example, I wondered:  What type of self-disclosure did the students exhibit?  How did they demonstrate vulnerability?  In one study, they disclosed that they were on academic probation.  In another, they told others that the doctor had chided them for being signicantly overweight.  These disclosures did not have direct relevance to the task though, and they did not come with any discussion of the importance of this issue to the work at hand.  Moreover, the people disclosing these weaknesses did not talk at all about how they were learning from their past experience and trying to improve.   Therefore, I have concerns about jumping to conclusions regarding the benefits or costs of leaders acknowledging vulnerability based on this research.   

An effective leader fosters psychological safety by demonstrating vulnerability through offering examples that show team members that he or she is not infallible.  However, the leader does not simply disclose failures from the past.  They should talk about how they have learned from those failures, or how experimentation helped them innovate.  They aren't simply blurting out personality flaws or weaknesses without some context!  

The scholars do acknowledge the limitations of their work, and they cite possible benefits of expressing vulnerability in work teams.  They cite Amy Edmondson's work, in fact.  She's the researcher who has done the most groundbreaking work on psychological safety.   By the way, Google found that psychological safety is an attribute of high-performing teams, confirming Edmondson's work.  Google also concluded that leaders who show some vulnerability tend to create higher levels of safety.   The scholars acknowledge some benefits of vulnerability toward the end of their paper. They write: 

Finally, although in our studies the goal of the discloser is to influence the receiver, and therefore we describe less influence and greater conflict as negative consequences for the discloser, there may be situations in which increased task conflict and reduced discloser influence actually results in more positive outcomes for the dyad or team (Nembhard & Edmondson, 2006). For example, a team leader might strategically choose to self-disclose a weakness as a way to increase involvement from lower status group members who may be intimidated by the status differences between members of the team.

In sum, be wary of such headlines in popular periodicals.  The underlying research often does not sync completely with the conclusion that has been reached by journalists.  

Discovering Analogous Inspiration: Can Crowdsourcing and Artificial Intelligence Help?

Source: Pixabay

When trying to develop a creative breakthrough, analogous inspiration can be incredibly productive.  I have written about this type of fuel for the creative process many times, including in a recent blog post about hospitals and Formula One race teams.  I also describe analogous inspiration in the Unlocking Creativity book, with an example about the Reebok Pump sneakers.  

One question you may have is:  How do I come up with the perfect analogy? How do I find great experiences or situations outside my industry from which I can draw inspiration? New research suggests that crowdsourcing and artificial intelligence can help. NYU's Stern School of Business recently posted a description of this research conducted by Professor Hila Lifshitz-Assaf, assistant professor of information, operations and management sciences, and her colleagues at other universities around the globe.  Here's a brief description:

Wilbur Wright, for instance, famously got his idea for using wing warping to steer an airplane while twisting a cardboard box. Using similar methods to solve disparate problems is a common theme in the history of innovation. But as problems become more complex and the amount of scientific information explodes, finding helpful analogies can be difficult, said Niki Kittur, a professor in Carnegie Mellon University’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute.

As described in a new report to be published online this week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers are addressing this problem by breaking down the process of identifying analogies, using crowd workers to solve individual steps in the process and training AIs to do part of the work automatically.

“We’re developing new tools that could unlock a whole set of interesting possibilities,” said Kittur, the lead author. “We’re just beginning to see how people might use them.”

Optimal Networks for Women & Men

Source: Wikimedia

Yang Yang, Nitesh Chawla, and Brian Uzzi have published a fascinating new article titled, "A network’s gender composition and communication pattern predict women’s leadership success."   The scholars examined the differences in social  networks of recent graduates from a top MBA program.  They sought to understand how network composition might affect the career opportunities and progression of these young graduates.  Yang, Chawla, and Uzzi discovered an important gender difference.  Kellogg Insight recently wrote an article about this research.  Here is an excerpt from that article describing the key findings from this study:  

They found an important gender difference: for men, the most significant factor affecting job status after graduation was how “central” they were in their networks—that is, how many highly connected people they have relationships with.  Successful women also tended to be more central, but that alone was not enough to land them a top job. The most successful women often had a tight-knit circle of female colleagues as well.

The reason for this difference may come down to the types of information that men versus women need to succeed. Presumably, having numerous connections provides ready access to what the researchers call “public information,” such as which companies are hiring and which types of candidates they’re seeking. For men, that alone may be enough to land a good job. “Men really need a network that’s going to maximize their access and exposure to market information,” says study coauthor Brian Uzzi, a professor of management and organizations at Kellogg.

Women, however, “need the same thing men need and one thing more,” Uzzi says. Specifically, women need “private information,” which may include insider tips about a company’s leadership culture and politics, or hints about how to make an impression in a male-dominated industry, for example.  However, women are only likely to put faith in such private information when it comes from trusted contacts with whom they have established relationships. Furthermore, only fellow women can provide the sensitive, gender-specific information that will be useful in a career context—hence the benefit of having connections who are both close and are women.

But there is a caveat, the researchers warn: if the contacts in a woman’s network do not have sufficiently diverse networks of their own, she may find herself in an echo chamber, hurting her chances of success.

Unlocking Creativity: A Conversation on Dr. Diane Hamilton's Radio Show

 

I had the opportunity to appear on Dr. Diane Hamilton's radio show this week. She's the author of Cracking the Curiosity Code: The Key to Unlocking Human Potential.  We talked about my latest book, Unlocking Creativity, as well as some other topics related to leadership and innovation. 

Studying Analogous Experiences: A Hospital and a Formula One Ferrari Racing Team

Source:  http://asq.org/healthcare-use/why-quality/
great-ormond-street-hospital.html

Firms can learn a great deal from studying organizations in other fields, rather than simply benchmarking rivals within their industry.   How do you choose the organizations to examine? Think in terms of analogous experiences.  What specific process, system, or behavior do we want to improve?  Who has similar challenges, and how might we learn about how they overcome those challenges?   For Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, Great Britain's largest pediatric hospital, the payoff from studying an analogous experience turned out to be quite substantial.  Who did they study? A superb Formula One Ferrari racing team!   Several years ago, Gautum Naik of the Wall Street Journal reported on this fascinating cross-industry learning experience. Here's an excerpt:  

Thousands of such "handoffs" occur in hospitals every day, and devastating mistakes can happen during them. This one went off without a hitch, thanks to pit-stop techniques of the Ferrari race-car team.

"It was smooth. We didn't miss anything," said Dr. McEwan, a senior anesthesiologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children. His role as leader of the handoff was partly modeled after Ferrari's "lollipop man," who uses a large paddle to direct drivers to the pit.

In one of the more unlikely collaborations of modern medicine, Britain's largest children's hospital has revamped its patient handoff techniques by copying the choreographed pit stops of Italy's Formula One Ferrari racing team. The hospital project has been in place for two years and has already helped reduce the number of mishaps.

Why "Unfocusing" Can Lead to Creative Breakthroughs

Breaking Up L Brands

CNBC reported this week that hedge fund Barington Capital has called for a break-up of L Brands, the parent company of Victoria's Secret as well as Bath and Body Works. James Mitarotonda of Barington Capital called upon the company to address the poor performance of the Victoria's Secret business.   He noted, "We believe that the declining performance of Victoria's Secret is primarily due to merchandising missteps and the failure to maintain a compelling brand image that resonates with its target consumers."   Mitarotonda pointed out that, in contrast, Bath and Body Works has performed exceptionally well in recent years.  Therefore, he would like L Brands to split into two separate firms.  He argued that investors are not placing "appropriate value" on Bath and Body Works because of the struggles at the Victoria's Secret business.   The proposal comes on the heels of news earlier this week that Target plans to unveil several lines of lingerie and sleepwear to compete with Victoria's Secret.  The once-mighty retailer appears to be receiving pressure on multiple fronts.  

I find the development quite interesting given that one of my MBA student teams performed a strategic analysis of L Brands last semester. They offered a highly critical examination of the Victoria's Secret strategy, arguing the brand requires a significant overhaul.  They pointed that management had  lost touch with key consumer trends.   Their analysis, frankly, is as thorough and insight as the critique put forth by Barington Capital.  I'm a proud professor!  

One should note that the proposed break-up, in and of itself, won't fix these branding and merchandising issues at Victoria's Secrete.  Simply breaking up without addressing the competitive positioning problems will not magically unlock value in the long run.   Moreover, the key question that needs to be asked about the strategy is whether there are substantial synergies between the two chains.  If there are, then breaking up will actually destroy some value.   On the other hand, if limited economies of scope exist, then a strong case can be made for addressing the Barington Capital proposal.   From afar, I don't see a compelling case for synergies that require these two firms to stay together.   Simply sharing corporate services is not a strong enough rationale for keeping the two units in one corporation.   The firm's products are rather distinct.  They don't share many suppliers.  They do share customers, but do the two companies use a wealth of common customer data to enhance each business?    It's hard to know from the outside.   Without some signficant revenue enhancement or cost reduction from collaboration between the two units, the case for a break-up appears compelling.  It will be interesting to see management's response, given that they have not been shy about divestitures in the past.  

What If We Have to Argue the Other Side's Position?

Imagine that your team has arrived at an impasse.  After a constructive debate about two viable options, the dialogue begins to deteriorate.  People's positions begin to harden, and two polarized camps emerge.  Individuals begin restating their arguments, often forcefully, rather than sharing new information or analysis.  Voices and tensions rise.  What can you do as a team leader in these circumstances?

Here's one interesting strategy you might consider.  I learned about this technique from the leader at a non-profit organization several years ago.  The senior management team had arrived at an impasse.  The leader adjourned a contentious meeting one day by giving team members some homework.  He asked the members in each of the two entrenched camps to come back the next day with a memo and presentation that made the case for the option for which the opposing camp had advocated.  In short, he asked each subgroup to step into the other side's shoes.  

He wanted them to try to understand the other side's perspective, line of reasoning, and assumptions.  He felt that they had stopped listening to each other and ceased trying to understand one another.   Asking them to swap roles could deepen mutual understanding, and in so doing, perhaps help the team uncover common ground or opportunities for compromise.  

In the end, the exercise did not immediately end the impasse, but it led to a much more constructive dialogue and debate.  Ultimately, they chose a course of action with which everyone could live, and for which all team members agreed to cooperate on implementation.  Everyone did not get all that they wanted, but they felt that they had been heard and understood by their colleagues and their leader, and thus, they could commit to the final decision.   

Will Divesting Old Navy Help The Gap?

Source:Wikimedia

Khadeeja Safdar reports in the Wall Street Journal today that Gap Inc. is splitting into two publicly traded companies. Old Navy, the company's low-priced apparel chain, will become an independent firm, while another company will operate the other brands including Gap, Banana Republic, and Athleta.  The article notes that Old Navy has been the highest-performing brand in the portfolio for some time, and that it has surpassed the company's namesake brand in total revenue.   Gap Inc.'s stock rose 25% when the news broke.  Safdar reports on the comments offered by CEO Art Peck when announcing the breakup:  

“The other brands overlap each other but overlap Old Navy less,” Mr. Peck said on a conference call with analysts Thursday. He said separating the two would allow both to make quicker decisions and focus their investments. Mr. Peck has long said the brands have advantages over their competitors because of the parent company’s combined size.

I have doubts about whether this move alone will help the core Gap brand address its long-running troubles.  Gap's struggles extend far beyond the issues experienced by many brick-and-mortar chains as consumers flock to e-commerce options.  Gap has been "stuck in the middle" strategically for years.   What do I mean by that?  Well, Old Navy has clearly occupied a low cost position in the casual apparel market.  Banana Republic has established a more differentiated, premium-priced position with higher quality and more professional clothing.  What's the Gap brand position in the market? For years, they have floating somewhere between a low cost and differentiated position, unclear about who they are or want to be.  I've been writing about this strategic problem and discussing it with students for at least ten years.  See this past blog post, for instance. Today's Wall Street Journal article describes one aspect of this problem:

Some analysts have said that Old Navy’s rise has expedited the Gap brand’s demise. “When your prices are lower and it’s essentially the same merchandise, you’re going to cannibalize the sales at the higher-end brands,” said Sucharita Kodali, a retail analyst at Forrester. “There’s no differentiation.”

Will splitting off the Old Navy brand fix this strategic issue at the Gap brand?  I don't see a clear reason why it will, unless other substantial changes are made.  Simply splitting the company in two does not address the "stuck in the middle" problem.  The Gap is not just stuck in the middle of Old Navy and Banana Republic; they are stuck in the middle of a host of other strong, well-positioned low cost and differentiated apparel brands.  

Are You an Overconfident Leader?

Dartmouth Professor Sydney Finkelstein, author of Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent, has published a thought-provoking article in the Wall Street Journal this week. He poses four questions that leaders can ask themselves to determine whether they suffer from overconfidence. I think it's a useful list. Here are the four questions:

1.  How much time do I really spend listening?

2.  Do I originate most of the ideas?

3.  Do I often feel like I’m the smartest person in the room?

4.  Do I think of myself as indispensable to my business’s success?

Apologizing for a Mistake at Work

Source:  Pixabay

We often hear about the importance of ackowledging failures and mistakes at work, and then learning from them.   Instead, of course, we often see people trying to make excuses or even hiding mistakes to avoid blame or finger-pointing.   Fear drives out opportunities for relationship-mending and learning in many instances.   How, though, should we apologize for a mistake that we have made at work?  What are the elements of an effective apology?   Some research by Roy Lewicki, Beth Polin, and Robert Lount Jr. sheds light on this issue.  

Lewicki and his colleagues have identified six components of an apology.  These components are:

• expression of regret
• explanation
• acknowledgement of responsibility
• declaration of repentance
• offer of repair
• request for forgiveness

Their experimental research has shed light on the structure of the most effective apologies.  First, and not surprisingly, they find that an apology consisting of more of these components is more efficacious than an apology containing fewer elements.   Second, they examined which elements were most important.   Lewicki and his colleagues find that an acknowledgement of responsibilty is the most critical component.   The second most important element is an offer to repair the damage. The third most critical feature of an apology is an explanation of the error.  

Heterogeneity in Experience Levels Helps Startups Succeed

Source: Pexels

You might think that a startup management team consisting entirely of highly experienced managers would clearly outperform teams including members with little experience.  After all, it would seem that past experience launching and running start-ups should be a good thing.  However, that bit of conventional wisdom turns out to be incorrect according to some interesting research by Dorina Thiessa, Charlotta Sirénb, Dietmar Grichnika.  They published a paper titled, "How does heterogeneity in experience influence the performance of nascent venture teams?: Insights from the US PSED II study" in the Journal Business Venturing Insights.  They examined 519 startups using a longitudinal dataset of new ventures in the United States.  Here is what they found:

Our results concerning management and start-up experience heterogeneities demonstrated that venture teams comprising only inexperienced members or only highly experienced founders seemed to be inefficient with regards to expected revenue and the progress of the venture. More specifically, even when heterogeneous teams had an overall low average level of management or start-up experience, they often outperformed those comprising only experienced team members. Furthermore, teams with lower levels of average management or start-up experience benefited from heterogeneous distributions of experience the most. One explanation for these results is that diversification of experience levels enabled team members to escape their own “knowledge corridors” (Gruber et al., 2013, p. 280), broadening the cumulative knowledge set of the team and thereby enabling more innovative insights and market responses, which ultimately resulted in improved venture performance. An accumulation of homogenous experience may also foster the use of mental shortcuts such as overgeneralization, and decreased engagement in counterfactual thinking (imagining alternative outcomes for past events) that assist in formulating more effective market responses (Baron, 1998, Baron, 2000, Shepherd et al., 2003). Thus, nascent venture teams with only experienced team members may fail to extract important insights from entrepreneurial action because team members become increasingly trapped in prevailing ways of thinking.

In sum, experience comes with some limitations or drawbacks.  You may have blinders on, or perhaps you cling too strongly to pre-established notions about how a new venture should be launched, structured, and led.  On the other hand, a team of novices will not likely thrive either. You need a mix of old hands and fresh eyes.  

How to be Awesome at Your Job Podcast Episode

Check out the latest episode of the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast by Pete Mockaitis. I had the privilege of being interviewed by Pete for this episode. We talk creativity and innovation in organizations, and we have some fun with a rapid fire set of questions about all sorts of things including:

• one of my dad's nuggets of wisdom, which I share with my students each year
• my favorite quote from Michelangelo
• my Starbuck addiction
• my love for teaching young people

How NOT to start your next meeting

How Does Team Size Affect Innovation?

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Lingfei Wu, Dashun Wang & James Evans have published a paper in Nature titled, "Large teams develop and small teams disrupt science and technology."   The scholars assembled a dataset of more than 65 million papers, patents, and software projects from 1954-2014.  They discovered that larger research teams tended to develop incremental improvements, while small teams conceived disruptive innovations.   

The findings remind me of Steve Jobs' preference for small teams.  Ken Segall, formerly an advertisting agency creative director, worked with Jobs for many years.  He described Jobs' philosophy on super-smart, small teams in an article for Fast Company several years ago:

Start with small groups of smart people–and keep them small. Every time the body count goes higher, you’re simply inviting complexity to take a seat at the table... The idea is pretty basic: Everyone in the room should be there for a reason. There’s no such thing as a “mercy invitation.” Either you’re critical to the meeting or you’re not. It’s nothing personal, just business.

Steve Jobs actively resisted any behavior he believed representative of the way big companies think–even though Apple had been a big company for many years. He knew that small groups composed of the smartest and most creative people had propelled Apple to its amazing success, and he had no intention of ever changing that. When he called a meeting or reported to a meeting, his expectation was that everyone in the room would be an essential participant. Spectators were not welcome.

For more on the Wu, Wang, and Evans study, check out this interview with two of the authors:

What Should You Ask Your Job Interviewer?

Source: Pixabay

Adunola Adeshola has written an interesting article for Forbes about the types of interview questions that can help you stand out as a job applicant.  She points out that many candidates spend a great deal of time preparing answers to the questions that their interviewer may ask.  However, they often do not spend a sufficient amount of time coming up with distinctive and thoughtful questions to pose during the interview.  Joseph offers three suggested questions:

1. Ideally, if offered this role, what are the biggest priorities you’d like me to tackle immediately in my first 90 days?

2. I noticed that you all are big on collaboration and failing fast [or other aspects of the company’s culture], what other qualities are you looking for in the new hire that will make fitting in with the team a no brainer?

3. Is there anything that concerns you about my background being fit for this role?

The first question enables you to picture yourself in the role.  What will the work be like?   How much autonomy and responsibility will I have?  What are the expectations for me, and what will I need to deliver on during the early part of my tenure?  It helps the applicant determine whether they will be engaged and enthused, as well as to identify whether they can succeed in this role.  On the other hand, it also shows the interviewer that you are forward-thinking and doing your best to prepare to be successful in this new role.   The second question enables in the candidate to make a strong case for why they fit culturally with this organization, or perhaps to discover ways in which he or she might not be a good fit.  Finally, the last question is risky if you are not prepared to address possible shortcomings in your candidacy.  On the other hand, if you are prepared, it enables the applicant to discuss some possible worries that are likely to be on the mind of interviewers.  

How Do You Compare Very Similar Options?

Source:  JBSA

You face a tough decision, and there appear to be two very similar options.  How do you choose?  University of Texas Professor Art Markman discusses this topic in an article for Fast Company this week.  He describes research that he has conducted about alignable vs. nonalignable differences.  He explains:

Research I did early in my career found that there are two kinds of differences that emerge from comparisons. Some differences are directly related to what a pair of options have in common. For example, if you are deciding between two apartments, one might be on a higher floor in the building than the other. These differences are called alignable differences, because they relate to how the information about the options is placed in correspondence.  Some differences are unrelated to what the options have in common. For example, one apartment might have a breakfast nook, while the other does not. These differences are called nonalignable differences.

When we compare options, we often focus intently on the alignable differences.  If there are few of these distinctions, we conclude that the alternatives are quite similar.   We struggle to decide.  However, we need to make sure that we are also examining the nonalignable differences.  These might be quite important, and they ought to be considered carefully.  Markman suggests stopping the comparison and contrast for a moment.  Use your imagination for a bit.  Try to imagine what it will be like to live with a particular option, and that may help you understand the attributes that you care about a great deal.  Then do the same thing with the other alternatives.  As you examine each option in this imaginative way, you might come to understand that some of these nonalignable differences matter a great deal more than others.