|
p.4 I am a cognitive psychologist and have spent my career observing the way people make decisions.
p.4 Decision researchers were trying to reduce errors, which is important, but we also needed to help people gain expertise and make insightful decisions.
p.4 Performance improvements = [decreasing] Errors + [increasing] Insights [JLJ - see p.156 for a modification to this formula for performance improvement]
p.16 But where do our insights come from?
p.17 Almost a century ago, Graham Wallas, a cofounder of the London School of Economics, published the first modern account of insight. His 1926 book, The Art of Thought, contains a model that is still the most common explanation of how insight works. If you do any exploration into the field of insight, you can't go far without bumping into Wallas, who is the epitome of a British freethinking intellectual.
p.18 In The Art of Thought, Wallas tried to apply concepts of psychology to show people how to think more effectively.
p.18 The most lasting contribution of The Art of Thought is contained in a chapter called "Stages of Control," in which Wallas presents a four-stage model of insight: preparation, incubation, illumination, and verification.
p.20 Wallas's four-stage model of insight is still the way most people explain how insight works. It's a very satisfying explanation that has a ring of plausibility - until we examine it more closely.
p.36 Insights don't count for much if we can't translate them into action
p.91 My attempt to penetrate the mystery of how insights originate had turned up five candidates: connection, coincidence, curiosity, contradictions, and creative desperation. Each candidate had some appeal.
p.107 While the Triple Path Model isn't the last word on insight, I see it as the next word. It seems like a plausible answer to the question about how the up arrow in the performance equation works.
p.108 What stops people from having more insights?
p.114 What happens to us to make us so stupid? What blinds us to the insights that dangle right in front of our faces?
p.120 No Insight: Gripped by Flawed Beliefs, Lack of Experience, Passive Stance, Concrete Reasoning... Gained Insight: Escape the Fixation on Flawed Beliefs, Experience, Active Stance, Playful Reasoning
p.126 Experience isn't just about having the necessary knowledge. Experience is about how we use our knowledge to tune our attention.
p.128 An active attitude leads to persistence.
p.129 Some people become impatient with speculation. They see the playful exploration of ideas as a sign of immaturity. They want closure, and they roll their eyes when a member of the group starts going off on tangents. They are concrete thinkers who just want to work with the facts, not with flights of fancy. Their concrete reasoning style wouldn't leave people very open to insights.
p.129 The playful versus concrete reasoning style is a relatively fixed personality trait.
p.129 Flawed beliefs, limited experience, a passive attitude, and a concrete reasoning style. A quadruple whammy that stifles insights.
p.146 The recommendation to filter out irrelevant data sounds good as long as we know in advance which data are relevant. It screens out the happy accidents and unexpected cues that often spark insights.
p.147 we never see what is filtered out. Google is wrapping us in a cocoon of our own beliefs.
p.145-147 The system should help Boone do his job better... The system should clearly display critical cues... The system should filter out irrelevant data... The system should help people monitor progress toward their goals.
p.153 Insights are disruptive. They come without warning, take forms that are unexpected, and open up unimagined opportunities.
p.156 When we move into complex settings and work with wicked problems that don't have right answers, we have to discover the goals as we pursue them.
p.156 Performance Improvements = [decreased] Errors and Uncertainty + [Increased] Insights
p.179 The purpose of science is to learn more about the world, including the world of insights.
p.196 Just because we have a good insight doesn't mean we'll behave with more maturity or make wise choices... therapists want to see those insights translated into action
p.213 In many cases, the problem isn't about having or noticing insights; it is about acting on them.
p.213-214 [Rosabeth Moss Kanter] "I still observe executives exhibiting the same lack of courage or knowledge that undercut previous waves of innovation. They declare that they want more innovation but then ask, 'Who else is doing it?' They claim to seek new ideas but shoot down every one brought to them."
p.214 The digital camera was invented by none other than Kodak! Steve Sasson, an electrical engineer at Kodak, developed the first digital camera in 1975. He and his supervisor got a patent for it in 1978... Kodak was aware of how digital technology was going to change the marketplace, but it was reluctant to give up high profit margins from photographic film to the much smaller profits from digital cameras.... When Kodak decided to get serious about marketing digital cameras, it zoomed to number one in sales by 2005. Unfortunately, that lead was quickly eroded by aggressive competition from Nikon, Sony, and Canon. And then came cameras embedded in cell phones, making digital cameras irrelevant for consumers who wanted to capture "the Kodak moment"
[JLJ - from Wikipedia: Steven Sasson invented the first digital camera in 1975. It weighed 8 pounds (3.6 kg) and had only 0.01 megapixels. The image was recorded onto a cassette tape and this process took 23 seconds. His camera took images in black and white. Not too much of a market for that kind of product (likely expensive) in 1975.]
p.241 Insights unexpectedly replace one story with a new one that is more accurate and useful.
p.242 The Triple Path Model grew out of the 120 cases that formed my project about insights.
p.246 My colleague Rob Hutton and I studied a set of successful engineers and scientists at an air force research laboratory. Once the stumbled on an important idea, they couldn't let it go. They spent months, sometimes years, pursuing it. Even when directed to move on to other projects, they would secretly continue to work on their discoveries. In many cases, they bet their careers on their insights. Their insights gripped them tightly.
|
