Cogni&ve  Bias  and  Project  Management  

06/06/2014 1

http://www.taesch.com/cognitive/cognitive-bias-project-management/2014/06/04/595 http://goo.gl/M7IM3O

What  is  this,  a  bias  ?  

•  “Insanity  in  individuals  is  something  rare    

•  but  in  groups,  par&es,  na&ons  and  epochs,  it  is  the  rule.”  

•   Friedrich  Nietzsche  German  philosopher  (1844  -­‐  1900)    

Le 10 th man http://goo.gl/W1LHmX

The  short  answer:  The  Fantasy  

(thank  you  Plato  and  Descartes  !)  

The  short  answer  :  The  reality  

The  short  answer  

The  short  answer  :  95  %  of  the  &me  ,  the  monkey  hold  the  wheel  

Overview  of  the  cards    

•  Defence  of  the  mind  set  •  Social  influence  •  Habits  and  personality  •  Faulty  reasoning,  Uncertainty,  Complexity  

•  Rela&ve  thinking  •  Automa&c  associa&on  

Honesty  Box    

–  In  a  somewhat  spookier  example,  researchers  staged  an  experiment  in  a  workplace  kitchen  wherein  employees  would  rou&nely  make  themselves  tea  or  coffee  in  exchange  for  a  fee  that  they  would  drop  in  an  ‘honesty  box’  

–   In  the  first  stage  of  the  experiment,  the  researchers  planted  a  picture  of  a  flowerpot  in  the  room,  while  in  the  second  stage  of  the  experiment  they  replaced  it  with  a  picture  of  a  pair  of  eyes    

–  The  two  pictures  were  then  alternated  back  and  forth  each  week,  for  a  period  of  ten  weeks    

Honesty  Box    

–  In  a  somewhat  spookier  example,  researchers  staged  an  experiment  in  a  workplace  kitchen  wherein  employees  would  rou&nely  make  themselves  tea  or  coffee  in  exchange  for  a  fee  that  they  would  drop  in  an  ‘honesty  box’  

–   In  the  first  stage  of  the  experiment,  the  researchers  planted  a  picture  of  a  flowerpot  in  the  room,  while  in  the  second  stage  of  the  experiment  they  replaced  it  with  a  picture  of  a  pair  of  eyes    

–  The  two  pictures  were  then  alternated  back  and  forth  each  week,  for  a  period  of  ten  weeks    

–  Finally,  the  researchers  compared  how  much  money  was  le[  in  the  honesty  box  across  the  2  situa&ons  in  the  experiment.    

–  Here’s  Kahneman  to  explain  the  results:  “no  one  commented  on  the  new  decora&ons,  but  the  contribu&ons  to  the  honesty  box  changed  significantly…  

–   On  average,  the  users  of  the  kitchen  contributed  almost  three  &mes  as  much  in  ‘eye  weeks’  as  they  did  in  ‘flower  weeks.’  Evidently,  a  purely  symbolic  reminder  of  being  watched  prodded  people  into  improved  behavior.  As  we  expect  at  this  point,  the  effect  occurs  without  any  awareness”  .  This  is  a  very  eye-­‐opening  example  of  how  System  1  can  influence  System  2,  and  also  hints  at  the  frightening  ways  that  System  1  might  be  exploited.  

First  Impression  

•  We  will  describe  two  personali&es,  Alan  and  Ben,  based  on  their  characteris&cs.  

•  Select  which  one  you  prefer  •  Just  watch  yourself  thinking  when  coming  to  this  conclusion  

•  Do  not  share  your  finding  loudly  ,  we  will  discuss  a[er  the  experience.  

Alan  

•  Intelligent,  Industrious,  Impulsive,  Cri&cal,  Stubborn,  Envious  

Ben  

•  Envious,  Stubborn,  Cri&cal,  Impulsive,  Industrious,  Intelligent  

Ben                                Alan  

•  Intelligent  •  Industrious  •  Impulsive  •  Cri&cal  •  Stubborn  •  Envious  

•  Envious  •  Stubborn  •  Cri&cal  •  Impulsive  •  Industrious  •  Intelligent  

Cogni&ve  Bias  according  to  Kahneman  

 •  Système  1  and  System  2  – Système  1  – Système  2  –  interac&on  

Système  1  &  2  

Système  1  

Système  2  

Ou&ls  &  Projec&ons  

Kahneman  :  summary  

•  The  Book  •  A  good  summary  

hep://newbooksinbrief.com/2012/11/13/24-­‐a-­‐summary-­‐of-­‐thinking-­‐fast-­‐and-­‐slow-­‐by-­‐daniel-­‐kahneman/  

 

Cogni&ve  Biases  

•  80+  :  hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cogni&ve_biases  •  300+  :  heps://www.recobia.eu/  (  non  public)  •  Many  classifica&ons    

–  We  took  one  “ac&onable”,  inspired  by  the  DQ  101  Stanford  Mooc  (Karl  Spetzler)  

•  Design  thinking  and  Cogni&ve  Bias  –  @stakken86  thesis  on  #DesignThinking  and  #Cogni&veBias  hep://goo.gl/wHU8bc  

•  My  cura&on  :  hep://www.scoop.it/t/cogni&ve-­‐bias  

Experimen&ng  the  switch  between  S1  and  S2  

Say loudly how may dots you see in the coming slides , as quickly as possible, and compare reaction time

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Are  you  coun&ng  in  your  head  ?  

Subi&za&on  

•  subi/za/on    •  (psychology)  The  process  of,  or  act  of,  glancing  at  a  group  of  a  few  objects  and  knowing  how  many  there  are  without  actually  coun&ng.    

•  hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subi&zing  

Subi&sa&on  pictures    

A  trip    to  Abilene  

 •  On  a  hot  a[ernoon  visi&ng  in  Coleman,  Texas,  the  family  is  comfortably  playing  dominoes  on  a  porch,  un&l  the  father-­‐in-­‐law  suggests  that  they  take  a  trip  to  Abilene  [53  miles  north]  for  dinner.  The  wife  says,  "Sounds  like  a  great  idea."  The  husband,  despite  having  reserva&ons  because  the  drive  is  long  and  hot,  thinks  that  his  preferences  must  be  out-­‐of-­‐step  with  the  group  and  says,  "Sounds  good  to  me.  I  just  hope  your  mother  wants  to  go."  The  mother-­‐in-­‐law  then  says,  "Of  course  I  want  to  go.  I  haven't  been  to  Abilene  in  a  long  /me."  

•  The  drive  is  hot,  dusty,  and  long.  When  they  arrive  at  the  cafeteria,  the  food  is  as  bad  as  the  drive.  They  arrive  back  home  four  hours  later,  exhausted.  

 hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abilene_paradox    

A  trip  to  Abilene    

•  One  of  them  dishonestly  says,  "It  was  a  great  trip,  wasn't  it?"  The  mother-­‐in-­‐law  says  that,  actually,  she  would  rather  have  stayed  home,  but  went  along  since  the  other  three  were  so  enthusias&c.  The  husband  says,  "I  wasn't  delighted  to  be  doing  what  we  were  doing.  I  only  went  to  sa&sfy  the  rest  of  you."  The  wife  says,  "I  just  went  along  to  keep  you  happy.  I  would  have  had  to  be  crazy  to  want  to  go  out  in  the  heat  like  that."  The  father-­‐in-­‐law  then  says  that  he  only  suggested  it  because  he  thought  the  others  might  be  bored.  

•  The  group  sits  back,  perplexed  that  they  together  decided  to  take  a  trip  which  none  of  them  wanted.  They  each  would  have  preferred  to  sit  comfortably,  but  did  not  admit  to  it  when  they  s&ll  had  &me  to  enjoy  the  a[ernoon.  

 hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abilene_paradox    

Group  thinking    •  A  Trip  to  Abilene  

Planning  Poker    

Timeboxing  

– Threat  or  opportunity  – Aversion  to  loss  – Change  Resistance  – Pomodoro    

Rep&lian  Brain  

Mammal  Brain  

Confidence  is  built  on  the  experience  of  success  

Conversa&onal  Intelligence  

Fear  ac&vate  Cor&sol  and  shut  down  the  cortex  

Trust,  Experiment,  Co-­‐create  

Itéra&ons    

Rela&ve  Thinking  

The  Middle  Op&on  is  never  selected…  

However  influence  the  choice…  

(Framing,  Anchor)  

Framing    •  hep://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ng9V2JneJ68  •  “the  five-­‐year  survival  rates  clearly  favor  surgery,  but  in  the  

short  term  surgery  is  riskier  than  radia&on”    •  When  it  came  to  the  short  term  risks  of  surgery,  though,    •  half  of  the  doctors  were  shown  stats  that  referred  to  the  

survival  rate  (which  is  90%  a[er  one  month),    •  while  the  other  half  of  the  doctors  were  shown  stats  that  

referred  to  the  mortality  rate  (which  is  10%  a[er  one  month)  .  

•  Here’s  Kahneman  with  the  results:  “you  already  know  the  results:  surgery  was  much  more  popular  in  the  former  frame  (84%  of  physicians  chose  it)  than  in  the  laeer  (where  50%  favored  radia&on).  

Rela&ve    Es&ma&on  

•  Wysa&  :  What  you  see  is  all  there  is.  •  Over  Op&mism  •  Over  confidence  •  in  some  quizzes,  people  rate  their  answers  as  "99%  certain"  but  are  wrong  40%  of  the  &me  

•  93%  of  American  drivers  rate  themselves  as  beeer  than  the  median  

•  For  difficult  tasks,  the  effect  reverses  itself  and  people  believe  they  are  worse  than  others  

•  hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overconfidence_effect  

Planning  fallacy  

•  The  planning  fallacy  describes  the  tendency  for  people  to  overes&mate  their  rate  of  work  or  to  underes&mate  how  long  it  will  take  them  to  get  things  done.[9]  It  is  strongest  for  long  and  complicated  tasks,  and  disappears  or  reverses  for  simple  tasks  that  are  quick  to  complete.  

•  hep://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planning_fallacy  

•  Another  study  asked  students  to  es&mate  when  they  would  complete  their  personal  academic  projects.  Specifically,  the  researchers  asked  for  es&mated  &mes  by  which  the  students  thought  it  was    50%,  75%,  and  99%  probable  their  personal  projects  would  be  done.[5]  

•  13%  of  subjects  finished  their  project  by  the  &me  they  had  assigned  a  50%  probability  level;  

•  19%  finished  by  the  &me  assigned  a  75%  probability  level;  •  45%  finished  by  the  &me  of  their  99%  probability  level.  

Illusion  of  control  

The  monkey  is  crap  at  stats,    and  rare  events  

He makes no difference between low probability and low impact

if something can be recalled, it must be important

Daily  Mee&ng  

Confirma&on  Bias  

Low  fidelity  Prototype  

Sunk  Cost  Fallacy  

Daily  Mee&ng  

Task  Board  

– Visualize  – Project  to  understand  complexity  beeer  –  (S2-­‐>S1,  WYSIATI  )  

Saturate  and  Group    

Informa&on  radiators  

Peer  Programming  

Priming  

•  Video    •  hep://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HRAKt0GakJM  

•  “the  ‘Florida  effect’  involves  two  stages  of  priming.  First,  the  set  of  words  primes  thoughts  of  old  age,  though  the  word  old  is  never  men&oned  (“worried,”  “Florida,”  “old,”  “lonely,”  “gray,”  “bingo,  );  second,  these  thoughts  prime  a  behavior,  walking  slowly,  which  is  associated  with  old  age.  All  this  happens  without  any  awareness.  When  they  were  ques&oned  a[erward,  none  of  the  students  reported  no&cing  that  the  words  had  had  a  common  theme,  and  they  all  insisted  that  nothing  they  did  a[er  the  first  experiment  could  have  been  influenced  by  the  words  they  had  encountered.  The  idea  of  old  age  had  not  come  into  their  conscious  awareness,  but  their  ac&ons  changed  nevertheless”  

Brainstorming:  the  65’s  way  •  Focus  on  quan/ty    •  Withhold  cri/cism  •  Welcome  unusual  ideas    

•  Combine  and  improve  ideas    

Brainstorming:  the  challenges  

•  Blocking    •  Collabora/ve  fixa/on    •  Evalua/on  apprehension    •  Free-­‐riding    •  Personality  characteris/cs    •  Social  matching    

 

Divergent  and  Convergent  Thinking  

Priming  for  Crea&ve  Conversa&ons  

•  Warm  vs  cold  –   head  table  :  Authority  (  cold)  vs  round  table  (  warm)  

– Hard  and  so[  chairs  – Whiteboard  :  we  will  have  an  open,  trus&ng  conversa&on  and  will  follow  through  with  our  agreements  

•  Bad  Start  :  Disengage,  re  engage.  Humor.  

Priming  for  Crea&ve  Conversa&ons  

•  Friend  of  Foe  ?  0,07  s…  •  FORCES:  

– Fairness  – Ownership  – Reciprocity  – Coopera&on  – Open  Expression  – Status  

•  Feel  Good  <>  Trust  :  (dopamine,  serotonine,  oxytocin  )      

Or  •  Fearful  •  Sad  •  Depressed  •  Upset  •  Angry  •  Overly  S&mulated  

– Excess  Dopamine;  norepinephrine  (stress)  –  Increase  testosterone  – Steroids  (  strength)    – Cor&sol  takes  up  to  36  hours  to  clean  from  body  

les  demandes  d'aide  explicites...    

Retrospec&ves  • What  did  we  do  well,  that  if  we  don’t  discuss  we  might  forget?    

• What  did  we  learn?    • What  should  we  do  differently  next  /me?    • What  s/ll  puzzles  us?  

Priming  Rétrospec&ve  

http://www.retrospectives.com/pages/retroPrimeDirective.html The prime directive says:One of the most obvious fears people have when first trying a retrospective is that the ritual will become a negative gripe session, interspersed with blame and counter blame. Clearly such an event will not contribute to much learning. The key to a constructive successful ritual is assuring that all the participants adhere to the Retrospective Prime Directive. Regardless of what we discover, we understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job they could, given what they knew at the time, their skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.

Free  Choice  of  Tasks  

– Not  invented  here  

V  :  Forget  you  are  a  human    

V  :  ‘Simplified’  reality  

the  waterfall  «  cycle  »    

•  Which  bias  are  going  to  show  up  in  this    ’cycle’?  

Design  thinking  

•  hep://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_thinking  

•  Le  Design  Thinking  est  une  méthode  de  créa&vité  et  de  son  management  qui  se  veut  une  synthèse  entre  la  pensée  analy&que  et  la  pensée  intui&ve.  Il  s'appuie  beaucoup  sur  un  processus  de  co-­‐créa&vité  impliquant  des  retours  de  l'u&lisateur  final.  

Design  Thinking  

Divergent  and  Convergent  Thinking  

Design  Thinking  Techniques  

•  Loss  aversion  •  Confirma&on  bias  •  Sunk  cost  fallacy  •  Anchoring  bias  •  Overconfidence  bias  

–  Above  average  :  all  the  children  are  above  average  –  limited  to  “easy”  tasks  in  which  success  is  common  or  in  which  people  

feel  competent.  For  difficult  tasks,  the  effect  reverses  itself  and  people  believe  they  are  worse  than  others    

–  Strikes,  lawsuits,  and  wars  could  arise  from  overplacement.      •  Framing  •  Deforma&on  Professionelle  

Other  Prac&ces    

•  Serious  games    •  Lean  startup  •  Design  thinking  •  Décision  quality    

Game  storming  /  Serious  games  

•  Jeux  sérieux    •  hep://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeu_s%C3%A9rieux  

Decision  Quality  

•  heps://novoed.com/DQ101  •  Mooc  @  Stanford  •  (La  classifica&on  u&lisée  ici  vient  de  la)  .  

Lean  startup  

•  hep://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_Startup  

Take  Away    

Don’t  fight  the  monkey  

•  Bias  Exists  (and  now,  you  know,  too…)  •  They  can  be  denied  :  simplis&c  ra&onalism    •  They  cannot  be  removed  

– There  is  no  bias-­‐free  “human”  

•  Human  keep  on  simplifying  reality  to  make  some  sense  of  it  

Live  with  All  of  you  

•  Cogni&ve  Dissonance  is  not  ”pleasant”  – Empty  mind,  Bad  gut  feeling  – We  were  taught  to  avoid  this  (conform,  align…)  – Most  Prefer  to  stay  in  the  ”comfort”  zone  

•  It    takes  courage  to  step  out  the  first  &me  – But  quickly  you  grow  to  become  a  learner,  because  it  is  rewarding    

•  As  a  group,  this  means  a  transi&on  to  a  learning  ‘Process’  /  Organisa&on.  (e.g.  Agile,  DT  ..)  

Knowing  and  Sharing    where  CB  impact  your  process  

 

Les  biais  cogni&fs      

Plus  (  de  surface)    

Plus  de  détails  ...  

La  Table  des  Ma&eres  Du  Livre  •   

i.  Introduc&on/Synopsis  •   

 •  PART  I:  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  THINKING,  WITH  A  FOCUS  ON  SYSTEM  1  •   

 •  Sec&on  1:  An  Introduc&on  to  Thought,  Fast  and  Slow  •   

 •  1.  Thought,  Fast  and  Slow  •   

 •  Sec&on  2:  System  1  Under  the  Microscope  •   

 •  2.  Learning  by  Associa&on  and  the  Priming  Effect  •  a.  Associa&on  •  b.  The  Priming  Effect  •  3.  Context  and  Causality  •  a.  Context  •  b.  Causality  •  4.  Judging  and  Evalua&ng  on  Limited  Evidence:  WYSIATI  and  Subs&tu&on  •  a.  WYSIATI  •  b.  Subs&tu&on  •  5.  When  System  1  Judges  People:  Stereotypes,  First  Impressions,  and  the  Halo  Effect  •  a.  Stereotypes  •  b.  First  Impressions  •  c.  The  Halo  Effect  •  6.  The  Interac&on  Between  System  1  and  System  2  •   

 •  PART  II:  THE  ERRORS  OF  SYSTEM  1  •   

 •  7.  An  Error  of  Associa&on  and  Priming:  The  Anchoring  Effect  •   

 •  8.  The  Framing  Effect  •   

 •  9.  File  Under  WYSIATI  •  a.  WYSIATI  and  Confidence  •  b.  WYSIATI  and  Es&ma&ons  •  c.  The  Two  Selves  •  d.  WYSIATI  and  Op&mism  •  10.  Causal  Errors  and  Sta&s&cal  Illiteracy  •  a.  Causal  Errors  •  i.  Mistaking  Stats  for  Causes  •  ii.  Mistaking  Luck  for  Causes  •  b.  Sta&s&cal  Illiteracy  •  11.  Loss  Aversion  •  a.  Avoiding  Losses  •  b.  Cu�ng  Our  Losses  •  c.  Risk  Aversion  •  12.  Expert  Intui&on  •