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and gentleman welcome we’ve got an
incredible show planned you guys this
evening we are going to be discussing
behavioral psychology and building
products that create change thank you so
much for being here whether you’re
listening to the podcast or into this or
you’re here now live with us right now
this is going to be a highly informative
and entertaining show so sit back grab a
drink
enjoy this conversation the human
experiences in session my name is Xavier
katana my guest for tonight is Matt
Wahlert matt is a behavioral scientist
and entrepreneur for over 10 years matt
has been applying behavioral science to
practical problems from start up exits
to fortune 500 to an array of pro-social
side projects he’s given hundreds of
talks on the science of behavior
behavior change and is currently the
healthcare industry’s first chief
behavior officer at Clover health a
Medicare Advantage plan changing the
model of insurance by changing behavior
Matt is a graduate of both the Lee Pope
Sean United World College of Hong Kong
and Swarthmore College he also spent
time in a ph.d program at Cornell he has
given hundreds of talks on sign the
science of behavior of change at such
places such as TEDx virgin and Microsoft
Matt it’s a pleasure welcome to hxp
Xavier hecta having me
yeah um thank you so much you gave me a
little bit of a panic attack before the
show when it’s okay we’re here we’re a
little bit late but it’s good well we’re
right on time my friend the one of my
favorite West Wing episodes the the
president Bartlet has to go out and and
to a debate and his wife cuts off his
tie just as he goes onstage so that they
have to Curley rip his tie off and put
on a new tie and it helps him sort of
stay in the moment I sometimes think you
know when it doesn’t work out when I
have to rush on stage sometimes those
are the most fun because I come in just
live totally live and since this is a
live podcast this time this is kind of a
fun experience yeah there’s an
adrenaline rush definitely when that
happens a bit of a pattern interrupt as
well so tell us you know tell us how you
got into this world of studying
behavioral change
give us sort of the background set the
stage for us a bit sure so I’m a little
bit of an unusual psychologist in the
sense that you know I grew up in very
rural
oregan I don’t think there were any
psychologists anywhere near me where I
certainly if there were I certainly
didn’t know them and I grew up with a
very sort of you know traditional
American view of what psychology was you
know you go to some you know guy with a
grey beard and you lay on his couch and
he asked you very for he’d like
questions then he tells you how you feel
and you know when I got into college I
really got an opportunity to discover a
whole different kind of psychology and
so I fell into something that we call
social psychology which is not about
sort of individual psychology not about
sort of abnormal psychology but instead
sort of about what makes us similar
across people right and how we interact
in very similar ways in reaction to our
environment and then one of the things
that sort of comes out of that is well
we then can change the environment to
change how people behave and so I got
very interested in sort of making the
world better by improving the
environments in which people behave to
help them change their behaviors and you
know had some really I had a wonderful
experience where I had this professor
and we read a paper about something
called the IAT the implicit association
test okay so some of you may be familiar
with it you know it the most traditional
version that people know of is the
racial IAT so it flashes good and bad
words and black and white faces and you
have to very quickly categorize them
left or right left or right and what the
authors proposed is that it shows
people’s implicit bias and I didn’t
disagree with the data they had
collected but I felt they were
overreaching their interpretation and my
professor this wonderful wonderful
teacher named Andrew Ward said this
really amazing thing to me he said look
the field agrees with their
interpretation but this is science means
in science there is an orderly way to
respond which is to run your own
experiment and prove that things are
different than the way that we had
understood them previously for sure and
that’s just like a I mean it’s just sort
of blew my mind as an undergraduate
because up to that point you know I had
seen you know privileged articulate you
know being smart those were the things
that sort of made people win arguments
and gave them power and the
approach to science was like no it
doesn’t matter that you’re like a first
generation college kid from rural Oregon
like you can be empowered by evidence
and so that just got me totally hooked
and I ended up you know sort of going
through and getting my social psych
degree and and and it’s sort of defined
the rest of my career hmm yeah I mean it
really does the book start at the end it
really does get into the science of it
all I’m not sure what I expected when I
opened it I mean I I’m really not sure
what I expect maybe I judged it by the
cover or something but it really does
dig into the science and sort of the
meat of creating these products that
that can build change for us
is this is this your first book it is my
first and only book and and certainly
it’s as far as I know and intend the
last I I was not looking to be an author
but but this wonderful imprint portfolio
which is part of Random House came to me
in and really convinced me that you know
they felt like I had something to say
and wanted to help me say it and they
did an amazing job of helping you know
sort of get it out of me and you know
it’s it’s it’s an amazing experience
writing something I have a four year old
and one of the things as save you know
from reading the book it is in a very
you know it’s it very much is in my
voice
there’s cursing you know it you know it
sort of it’s very self referential I use
myself as an example my family is an
example I make fun of myself throughout
it and someone pointed out to me after
it came out they said you know if
something happened to you you know
you’re your kid now has this amazing you
know sort of artifact that is very
clearly you and a summation of your
life’s work to this point
mm-hmm and it’s sort of a lovely thing
and so I’m very glad to have written it
I don’t know that I have anything more
to say but quite glad that I had this to
say right now well I mean you never know
I mean things might change later down
the road you might find yourself you
know writing another book but let’s get
into this one okay so at the beginning
of the book you talk about Apple I mean
that’s that’s a go-to when you’re
referencing products that that changed
the world right so I mean you talked
about how the narrow
around its success doesn’t really tell
the true story of of Apple and then you
get into something you call the two
why’s what are the two wise and and how
do they they affect the way we build
products yes so Apple was chosen sort of
deliberately because to your point it is
sort of the canonical example and people
are very often associate Apple success
with its brand which I think certainly
the brand is a component of it but you
know the way I always sort of think of
products is to your point these two
why’s so once we’re talking about
designing for behavior change right once
we’ve established what behavior it is we
want to change which is a very important
and not always easy first step but once
we’ve done that then it essentially just
boils down to two questions which are
why would anyone ever want to do that
and why aren’t people already doing it
mm-hmm and so if you said you know I
want to get people to eat pistachio ice
cream
you know you would you need to start
from the place of well why would anyone
ever eat pistachio ice cream and why
aren’t given that there are reasons to
eat pistachio ice cream why are they not
already eating pistachio ice cream and
that’s what allows us to then
systematically go you know start to
build interventions that act on the
reasons that people would ever want to
do it and then remove the barriers to
acting on those motivation right right
uh-huh I mean I find it fascinating to
study this so then you you talk about
different types of pressures promoting
and inhibiting pressures and I mean this
is serene the two wise are sort of at
the heart of your book but it’s it’s
linked to promoting pressure and then
second to inhibiting pressure what do
you mean by these different pressures
and how they how do they affect
behavioural change yeah sure so
promoting pressures are anything that
makes a behavior more likely inhibiting
pressures make a behavior less likely
and so the canonical example I use in
the book is mm who’s right you know we
eat them because of taste and brand and
color and all these wonderful things and
then you know we things that make them
less likely our you know availability
cost etc and so those are you know those
are sort of mapped to those two
questions right you could think of
promoting pressure
as what are all of the things that make
what are all the reasons that one might
eat M&Ms I I’m always a little I don’t
love the word reasons because it leads
us to this very logical place and you
know identity and emotion can be some of
the most powerful reasons there are but
it’s not all logic but you know there
are these reasons to do things which we
call in hip promoting pressures and then
there are these inhibiting pressures you
know the reasons not to do them things
that make them more difficult and you
know that we have predictable errors it
turns out as creators of things so for
example when you ask people to create
you know to create a behavior I want
Savior to go to the gym more often they
gravitate towards promoting pressures so
we have this bias where it turns out we
are more likely to generate promoting
pressure based interventions when when
it’s phrased as more and if I said you
know how do you get Savior to go less to
the gym right then you gravitate towards
those inhibiting pressures well I’ll
punish him I’ll make it harder to do and
so what that implies is that there is
almost always opportunity space on the
opposite side we don’t think enough
about the barriers that prevent people
from doing things instead we just
automatically think well they just don’t
want it enough and so I think by you
know moving from sort of the the madmen
world of just you know going with what’s
natural instead mapping out these
pressures and and more directly
addressing them we can get to a better
place you know one of the examples I
often use is helping women get raises
right one of the really problematic
narratives has been you know sort of
well women just need to want it more
than you to be more aggressive they need
to lean in etc but I don’t know any
women that don’t want to be paid fairly
right there’s no women that I know that
are like yeah I really want to be to
make less than I’m worth I want to get
less than my business value sure right
but but because we sort of phrase it as
a well they need to do X more they
gravitate towards those motivations when
in reality you know women face a number
of barriers a number of what we would
call inhibiting pressures that make it
harder and so if we want to change their
behavior what we really need to do is
remove those inhibiting pressures not
focus on
on sort of the promoting pressures huh
god that’s so fascinating I I was
actually watching and when I was when I
was reading this book I it made me think
of something that I saw of Steve Jobs
and it’s like it was this video of him
explaining how to market their products
and it was a phenomenal video and he was
talking about I mean he brought up Nike
and he brought up Apple and he was
talking about selling a you know like a
vision and he talked about how you know
in these commercials that were do
performing the the most well that nor
Nike was never talking about shoes they
weren’t giving these technical like
examples of how their their shoes you
know make you walk better or run better
or whatever it is it’s really
interesting to me how we can play with
these different perceptions to the
success of a brand or the the failure of
a Brian
Brent absolutely and and I actually know
the clip you’re talking about that
except would send it to me earlier this
week so I was very fresh in my mind the
thing I think that maybe people miss in
that is it’s not just the brand it’s the
connection of the brand to what they
actually do so I’ll give you a Charles
travail over at Interbrand and I had a
conversation once and he actually made
and he did an experiment once where he
made something I can’t remember the name
right now it was like an expectations
index but basically he measured you know
if we show Savior a commercial for an
iPhone and then ask him you know what do
you expect this iPhone will do for you
and then we give it an iPhone and let
him play it play play with it how well
how can grew into are those right so
just the does the advertising accurately
portray the experience that you will
have using the thing and so he called it
you know sort of the expectation gap or
something where he looked at brands
where you know they’re they’re
advertising gave you a false perception
and brands where it gave you a much more
real life expression and I think the
thing about Apple that was quite magical
is yes they had these very lofty
commercials about you know creating
things using the iPhone but then they
actually delivered on it right like
using an iphone to create something
actually is sort of magical and they
have created an amazing device for
creation right and so you know it wasn’t
just an empty brand promise this is
where I think you know coke you know
shows you images that would make you
think if you drank a coke that you would
you know dance really well or look
really fashionable or you know have a
really great significant other or
whatever and in reality drinking coke
will do none of those things for you
right and so I think it’s that marrying
of you know the promoting pressure that
is that as identity and brand etc to the
actual experience of using the thing
that is that creates the sort of true
magic hmm yeah that makes a lot of sense
and you know I was really thinking about
promoting and inhibiting pressures and I
was thinking about I was trying to think
of examples of ad campaigns or products
that had shifted in you know the only
thing that I could think of was like
smoking right like there there was this
whole trend of celebrity smoking that
was a big thing through the 60s and then
it started to change right so when you
talk about you talk about inhibiting
pressure and how that is kind of your
your favorite why why do you prefer that
over promoting pressure well I think you
know part of it is the thing we already
talked about a little bit right there is
this notion that the it just turns out
that people ignore inhibiting most of
the time when we think about changing
behavior we’re trying to get people to
do something more right unless you have
a kid then you’re often trying to think
about them to do something less but in
many you know in most professional
context it’s about more of a behavior
and so that means that the predictable
error that they miss is not putting
enough emphasis on the inhibiting
pressure side but there are some other
special characteristics of inhibiting
pressures that make them particularly
attractive to me one of them is the
homogeneity it turns out that promoting
pressures are art tend to be relatively
heterogeneous so if you know we talked
about going to let’s go back to going to
the gym we want Savior to go to the gym
like Xavier goes to the gym because he
wants you know six-pack ABS Matt go to
the gym because of the way it makes him
feel and Bob goes to the gym because you
know
there’s a pretty person at the who you
know there’s a pretty person at the
front desk right those are all different
motivations but the inhibiting pressures
are the same you know distance he said
the inhibiting pressure constant for all
of us the cost of the gym is an
inhibiting pressure for all of us right
and so it turns out that in general and
debating pressures are more Universal
and so what that means is you know sort
of pound for a pound if I can remove one
in promoting pressure or one inhibiting
pressure the inhibiting pressure will
pay off across more people because it
turns out that the that that you know we
all tend to be affected by the same
inhibiting pressures hmm yeah I mean it
again it’s resoundingly accurate does it
does fall true I want to talk about IDP
in intervention design process I mean
this is the first time that I’ve
actually read this word heard this word
before so or this term before so I mean
why don’t you explain that to us
nothing I made it up
yeah we just needed a way to so so I to
the horror of my publisher when they
first talked to me I was like I really
want to wait a handbook right like that
my original title for this thing was
like the handbook of applied you know
behavioral science they were like you
can’t call it that no one will buy it
but like I wanted something that was
really intensely practical you know I
love pop psych books there’s a number of
really great books out there but I think
that they well they stir up our interest
they don’t actually tell us they don’t
change our behavior I sort of at the
beginning of the book point out the
whole point of my book is to change your
behavior right if you don’t walk away
from the book more likely to actually go
create behavior change then I have
failed in my job and so one of the ways
to reduce the inhibiting pressure to
changing your behavior is to give you a
very structured process to follow and
that’s what the IDP is it’s not meant to
be the be-all end-all I’m sure someone
will come up with a better version right
and I think that’s great I hope people
do but what I can do as the author is
sort of say here’s a template that makes
a little easier to do so that the IDP
just
a you know roughly eight to ten week
process in which you articulate a
behavior that you want to change do
something we call the behavioral
statement you then go out and do
quantitative and qualitative insights to
try and understand by looking at data
and observing humans like what the you
know how to answer those two questions
why would anybody ever want to do this
and why are they not already doing this
you then map that out into those
pressures and start to design
interventions and then really key
because remember this is science you go
out actually pilot interventions right
so you actually go try things in the
world and measure whether they are
effective which is I think really really
key to to you know sort of the
advancement of the human species and and
sort of better products is the notion
that we can actually go try things first
see if they work iterate iterate iterate
iterate before we’re like ready to
actually bring things to scale right
yeah I mean this there’s so much I want
to ask you Matt so there’s okay there
are these few examples Facebook has it
creates no content
uber owns no cars whatsoever Airbnb
well-honed
owns no hotels there do what are they
doing that is so different that has led
to such a great success that they’ve
they’ve sort of encountered the success
of a company is never one thing right
it’s timing
it’s the zeitgeist of many things that
are that are going on in the world but I
mean I think if you look at something
like Facebook we know Facebook was
tremendously effective at changing
people’s behavior and and Facebook in
particular you know I think often
companies that are very successful are
changing our behavior see something or
and often stumble on it that you know
maps to a very core motivation or
something that we hadn’t previously
realized I think Facebook’s sort of
version of that was identity I don’t
think they realized I don’t think people
prior to that had had really clearly
articulated and understood that as
disposable income goes up people will
spend the dama
and amount of their time and money on
you know sort of trying to stand out or
fit in or both and so by creating a
really handy tool you know I mean
Facebook has an amazing dual purpose
right it both makes us feel connected to
everybody else but also gives us a
chance to be unique special individuals
and so that combination I think prior to
Facebook was very rare you know in
roomers case for example I really do
think it was payment right I don’t think
people realized how strong the
inhibiting pressure of payment was and
it’s actually interesting to me in many
ways I feel like people still haven’t it
is shocking to me where what you know 10
15 years out from from uber I think it’s
been 10 years why are we still paying in
restaurants I don’t understand it like
given the complete you know people are
like it’s a hard problem yes I get it’s
a hard problem lots of things are hard
problems it is astonishing to me that I
still have to wait for a check hmm given
the I think what uber is demonstrated
the incredible power of just what I’ve
done I get up and leave mmm I can’t
chucking to me that we have not removed
that inhibiting pressure of payment
across more across more sort of places
in the food chain
sure sure I mean it what has changed in
the last you know 10 years is it
information is it the way is it the way
that we connect socially because of the
Internet and is it a platform that we’re
giving these new spaces
I mean entrepreneurship has kind of
exploded in last 15-20 years or so yeah
you know entrepreneurship has I think
there’s two factors that have really
made entrepreneurship sort of there’s a
promoting pressure and there’s an
inhibiting pressure on the uninhibited
pressure side it is now much easier to
to sort of get to a minimum version of a
product quickly across almost every
across almost every part of creating a
product so meaning is now easier to
market something than it’s ever been
before it’s now easier to actually
literally build something than it’s ever
been before right it’s it’s it’s easier
to then measure
the effectiveness of things more than
it’s ever been before so I think that
those sorts of things you know that
reduction of inhibiting pressure around
just the creation process right is so
much you know I think people would be
blown away you know if you transported
somebody from a hundred years ago you
would be blown away by how easy it is to
create right and I think a hundred years
from now will experience that as well I
think that you know if we could fast
forward you know it’ll just be it is
even to me right so I’m 37 years old
right in my lifetime you know in my sort
of teenage years onward there has been
digital photography but it used to be
really really hard right you had to like
you take a picture onto a camera then
you know to connect the camera to a
computer then you had to like process it
in facebook and the kit and the pictures
were all really bad until you have to
color correct them and you had to like
you know edit out all the dust and the
bits and whatever you know and now write
almost essentially seamlessly I can take
a nearly perfect picture like
automatically I don’t have to download
or upload it or do anything anywhere at
Liz Rabbids it on my phone it’s backed
up in the cloud I can auto share it on
whatever right set up appropriately the
inhibiting pressures are almost nil
which is why the creation velocity has
gone up so much the other thing about
entrepreneurism entrepreneurism that has
changed is you know I’m I’m a sort of
perfect age to have watch this happen
when I was younger nobody talked about
entrepreneurs right it was not an
identity based segment and if it was it
was sort of like you know a negative
identity based statement right it was
sort of a sketchy thing to do now it’s
you know everybody wants to be it it’s
an incredibly desirable thing to be
right and so I the way that I am so
often struck by this because that is not
universally true globally and so as a
guy who gets to travel a fair bit and do
speaking engagements in other parts of
the world you know I often get to be in
environments where you know being an
entrepreneur is still considered a
little bit sort of risky and edgy and
something that you know sort of it’s
like little like being a starving artist
right and so watching that play out and
watching the struggle of entrepreneurial
people as they you know try and interact
in an environment where everyone is
telling them that that’s the wrong
choice I think is really is really
interesting yeah I mean there there is
there does seem to be a sort of feature
of the entrepreneur ships or vision or
role that is regarded in a very starving
artist’s sense it may be culturally it
is that is there is there a single thing
that you see when you’re in the startup
world quite a bit so I mean is there a
single thing a resounding universal
truth that you see founders doing that
you’ve you know that you think or you
regard as this is the right move this is
what you did correctly this is how you
saw through a problem is anything like
that yeah I mean the number one thing
that I think people do correctly this is
very hard to do I think is figure out
how to run the right-sized pilot right
meaning too small and you can falsely
abandon an idea or falsely confirm
something and really think it’s the
right thing and too large you know you
can just run out of sort of resources
before you have time to pivot right and
so there’s this very interesting sort of
threading the needle effect where you
know you just want to hit just the right
size that you still maintain enough
resources to be able to pivot around and
sort of you know get the right thing but
that you’re not you know so small that
you reach a sort of a false confirmation
or a false rejection of an idea hmm okay
fair enough
has there have you noticed or seen like
the sort of unicorns that maybe would
give a false impression of you know the
range of time it takes the success of a
product or launch yeah yes and I think
part of the problem is narrative right
like you know I feel like I’ve talked
about uber a lot and given how much I
sort of the sexism if their founder but
like uber is a good example where I
think what people tell the narrative
they’re like oh
overnight right it took over the world
and I’m like you mean over the course of
10 years right right like that’s not
quite overnight man right like it was
very very long and you know it’s sort of
taking you know it has had a profound
change and relative to its change I can
understand what people are saying right
they’re saying well you know given the
size of the magnitude of the behavior
change it sure seems short but it out
tell you’re a long time and I got a four
year old and he changes every week right
like I think that people just have this
this narrative where and you know it’s
part of the way that you know sort of
human recall works you know we have this
tendency to not accurately understand
time and having done start you know been
successful at building and selling
startups it’s long it’s a slog you know
it may look like an overnight success
and part of the problem is there’s a
tipping point right you know there are
not all startups by the way have a
hockey stick but many of them do and so
there’s this tremendously long period
where you’re working very hard and
nobody knows who you are and then all of
the sudden it seems like everybody knows
who you are right and that’s true medias
are really another you know we don’t
have to go to startups to that media is
a great example of that right there’s
this artist that nobody’s heard of and
then all of a sudden it feels like
everybody’s talking about right right
and then you know either they have
staying power they don’t books great
example you know like you know it’s it
takes a really long time to write a
really good book and it’s not just the
writing I mean it took me 10 years to
figure out how to do this right the
writing was the easy part for sure and
so you know that journey is very very
long and I think that people
misunderstand you know so many ideas
people just give up too early yeah I
mean I I think I think that’s there’s no
question I mean I think a lot of people
see the end result of whatever a product
might be or you know whether it’s an
artist and a new album that they’re
releasing or you know the the growth of
a company and sort of the mapping of a
product to launch and then you know you
receiving it on this this end and you
thinking oh well wow you know they they
struck gold here
and you know they were able to do
something no one else did and that’s not
often the case it’s usually a lot of
failure that comes with you know true
successes just failing over and over and
over until you finally kind of get it
right yeah 100% and I think that you
know it’s like any expertise right you
spend years learning how to make
something look look easy right
people often sort of a comment on my
speaking style right because I’m a very
unusual speaker every one of my talks is
different I don’t prepare at all I have
no notes and no slides I just go up and
talk about my thing and love that and
people often sort of comment on that and
they’re like you make it look so easy
and I’m like yeah because I know my
topic super well right I spent a
really long time like getting really
good at this one thing right and so yeah
if you ask me to talk about that thing I
do really well I I often think about you
know what if you asked a company to
solve another kind of problem right so
this is sort of my my way of staying
humble as a founder and as a start-up
executive right it’s still like you know
sure but if you went to the you know
Travis and you said okay Travis now
solve you know medicine like yeah baby
he’ll do OK at it but you’re terrible
right like no prior success when success
is one is a data point of one right
predicts almost nothing about the future
right it’s only repeated success that
does and so you know the people that are
that my heroes in the entrepreneurism
space are people like Dave cancel right
David cancel over in Boston you know you
just look at his resume of stuff and
you’re like dude like you’re like 10
companies in and everything you touch
turns to gold so either you’re the best
company picker I’ve ever seen
we’re just really good at this right and
so I mean there are some people who are
just sort of born to do this and to
create products and solve problems and
then there are others that you know go
the other direction and it’s it’s a hard
Road to learn that you know you’re not
that guy you know you’re just not really
meant to lead a company lead the charge
yeah I there’s a there’s a very
formative experience for me I I often
lecture Columbia Lee Columbia and they
had a one of my friends that runs a
summer program for for young
entrepreneurs it’s you know it’s run out
of business school and so you know young
kids high school kids come around the
world to participate in this
entrepreneurs program and I remember
giving a talk what summer and I said how
many of you want to be the CEO of your
startup and every single one of them
raised their hand and I said and I said
look do you how many of you think I’m
really cool and everybody raised their
hand because they’re required to and you
know because I’m old and they’re young
and so they were like oh yeah you’re
really cool and I was like I have no
desire to be the start of the CEO of
anything ever I’ve never been the CEO
and I never want to be the CEO and this
was really challenging for a lot of them
because in their minds right they had
that was that was you know what it means
to be an entrepreneur is to be this one
thing I think it’s not that find the
thing that you’re good at it hopefully
you love that thing and and you know but
find the thing that you’re really good
at and do that startups need GMOs and
they need CTOs and they need you know
heads of bizdev and they need product
people and they you know they need all
of these things in order to function
mm-hmm and you don’t have to be good at
all of them you just have to be good at
one of them and and then have a broad
interest in the rest you know I talk
often about I have a very very very
diverse team at Clover of the people
that work for me you know I only have
one white guy and recently added a
second a white woman but everybody else
is a person of color and the everyone
else is a person of color and a woman
actually and so and they come from
really tremendously diverse backgrounds
personally professionally cetera and so
the first time we ever had a team
meeting you know I have a very ask me
anything sort of stale style and so one
of them was like why us right you’ve
built this really weird-looking team and
this doesn’t look like any team I’ve
ever seen like why us and so I gave them
something
a scale from psychology called the need
for cognition scale and it’s basically a
measure of like how much do you take
pleasure in thinking and so and it’s a
lovely scale because I think a lot of
scales sort of Telegraph what the right
answer is and I don’t think it does this
you know it has it has items like I
really hope everything in my life is a
puzzle right not everybody would say yes
to this lots of people would say man
that sounds really terrible I don’t want
everything you might like to be a puzzle
but they all of course score off the
charts high on the need for cognition
and so I talk about you know having a
t-shaped team they all have individual
expertise that they’re very good at but
they have really broad interest and so
we talk about you know the bottom part
of the tea is their legs and the and the
top part of tea is their arms and the
thing I always tell them is you know
your legs help you stay grounded and
your arms help you fly right so having
really deep deep expertise at something
gives you the ability to always be
employed and employable right because
you know you can always get a job in
that expertise but you know having broad
interests create you know being curious
about the world being really engaged is
what gives you the ability to really
have exponential sort of job growth is
that is that ability to sort of spread
your arms and sort of be interested in a
little bit of everything while still
maintaining that deep expertise and I
think that’s one of the one of the hard
parts for for the generation directly
below me is I feel like people often
only get one of those so they’re sort of
jack-of-all-trades folks who or Jill of
all trades who sort of like you know
have done a really good job of curating
their curiosity but they haven’t really
found something that they can have deep
expertise in and vice versa there are
some people who are incredibly skilled
at one thing but have sort of neglected
being interested in in and engaged in
the rest and I think that’s a that’s a
real challenge for through that
generation that and you know one of my
fervent hopes is that we find ways to
make it okay for them to to you know
sort of both curate expertise and go go
gonna be interested broadly yeah I mean
it’s amazing I there I’m watching the
the chat go by right now and there are
people writing about you know running
startups and
so it’s interesting you know but I
wanted to ask you about a situation I
guess I mean it’s it’s it’s the the
early 1900s like just the turn of the
century and it’s a battle of two minds
Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla and there
was something that they did completely
differently
right and I guess Edison was able to
take his product to market better that’s
why we you know use I mean that’s why we
know more about him and Nikola I mean
he’s he’s not really talked about you
know in in the mainstream so why why do
you think that is what do they do
differently there well they I mean first
of all I’m gonna talk about it but I
should point out that there are people
who have have thought very deeply about
this and are much more to kill it that I
am about it I think actually one of my
so so weirdly there’s a wonderful author
Graham Moore who I know very well and in
during when we were doing the second
startup he wrote his second book in our
space and it is actually it’s he writes
often sort of historical fiction and he
actually writes specifically about
Westinghouse Nikola Tesla and and Edison
and sort of the race to two to the
lightbulb and sort of like broad
lighting and electricity across the
United States and you know sort of
highlights the way that they ran very
very very very different labs you know
Edison essentially ran a factory his he
he in many ways I think actually was
doing what unfortunately I think were
too often encouraging you know
entrepreneurs to do these days which is
just endlessly iterate right so he was
I’m gonna throw a thousand scientists at
it and they’re all gonna try slightly
different variations and then one of
those variations will work which was
very very different than Tesla Wright
who had very few economic resources
until he was very pointy right he was
like you know he was chose very
carefully what he was doing he pursued
in a sort of very narrow way very
specific theories and so you know
of those if you try to hit a target you
can aid or you can get a shotgun and
they’re both valid ways of doing the
thing you know I tend to I think the
sort of notion of the IDP is to like aim
your shotgun right meaning it do need to
run probably more than one pilot but you
shouldn’t just be aiming like only a
fool doesn’t aim right you have the
opportunity to him it takes only a very
short amount of time to spend some time
looking at the data you know and doing
the quantitative and qualitative things
that will allow you to derive insight
and so why wouldn’t you do that which
you know it just always seems sort of
weird to me that people have have you
know constructed a world where they’re
not yeah I appreciate that answer and
just bringing it back onto you topic
here we kind of went off the rails my
fault so behavioral statement you know
what you talk about this in the book
how important is a behavioral statement
to the the process of building a product
I mean I think it’s it’s absolutely
critical and and anything I think it’s
hard right because when you build a
process you’re like no every part of it
is essential and depending on what time
of day you catch me I might be like the
thing people screw up the most is blank
right I think even earlier in this
interview I said you know the problem is
that people don’t do the the piloting
the science part right but I do have to
say that like certainly it all begins
with with clearly articulating a
behavior and so we talk in the book
about writing be hero statement which
has you know motivation and a population
and limitations and a behavior and a way
to measure it but it really is of all of
that it’s articulating a behavior that
you want so so often people articulate
things that are not behaviors to me
right they’re like I want people to love
my product I’m like what does that mean
and they’re like well I want them to
love it and I’m like okay well but what
does that mean like how would you know a
person loved it
and they said yeah we’ll talk about it
okay I’m like okay great so your goal is
to get people to talk about your product
right is it is it okay if they talk
badly about your product no well I don’t
want that okay so great your behavior
you want people to talk positively about
your product right that’s a behavior we
could go design to create something that
people will talk positively about right
and we can remove the inhibiting
pressures you know we can make share
buttons and we can make it easier for
people to talk and you know all these
things it’s so interesting to me many of
the things that you would even use on
the promotion of this show are
psychological in nature right the very
notion of a share button is the removal
of an inhibiting pressure sharing the
share button does not make the content
any more interesting at all right
there’s no promoting pressure of the
share button the share button is simply
inhibiting pressure reduction right and
so consciously articulating I want
people to share it creates is what
creates the share button you can’t get
there unless you are consciously
articulate the behavior that you want
and so I think writing a good clean
behavioral statement is sort of the
fundamental part of the process and you
know it’s all downhill from there if you
know the behavior you want to create in
my experience having watched people do
this a lot the rest tends to sort of
fall in line right it becomes
increasingly obvious how to how to make
that happen if you can get to really
being really really really clear about
the one thing you actually want people
to do mmhmm yeah I mean the next thing
that you bring up is anchoring and
adjustment and you talk about how this
is you know key to developing writing a
behavioral statement that is in line
with sort of your vision what are those
two things if you could get into that
please yeah sure we could talk about the
anchoring adjustment factor so this is a
well-known effect in psychology the the
canonical example right is if I said you
know Xavier how tall is the is the is
the Empire State Building taller or
shorter than a hundred feet taller okay
great so how tall is the Empire State
Building
do you think it’s like 13,000 something
feet but that’s probably too much right
I don’t know that’s gonna be your guest
okay that’s a good guess I like it right
and so then i go to i go to bizarro
xavier right I go to katana where you go
right to katana I say the same thing I
say okay well he’s the
our state building taller or shorter
than a million feet huh I just looked it
up by the way it’s 1,454 feet oh my god
some way off and we say you know it’s a
taller or shorter than a million feet
and and you would say shorter right
because it’s obviously not a million
feet and then I’d say well how tall is
is you know the sort of vampire State
Building
and you might say 10,000 feet or a
hundred thousand feet right because
you’re adjusting down from that piece
and so in a behavioral statement one of
the reasons that we always articulate
the behavior as absolute so meaning I
want you know people to – you know a
hundred percent of the time to do this
thing not fifty percent of us I’m not
twenty five percent of time is because
the moment you actually you know sort of
go down from the absolute it leaves
wiggle room for well I you know I just
don’t need to get those people or I
don’t need to have that happen there
right and so when we express absolutes
we’re actually much more likely to hit
the target if we sort of you know we’re
so much more likely to get to the ninety
percent you know if we say a hundred
instead of fifty hmm and so that’s why
we write very concrete absolute
behavioral statements right when someone
wants to go somewhere they will take an
uber 100% of the time now obviously that
will never happen right people will walk
and take buses and subways and all sorts
of other things but by articulating it
in that way we we don’t artificially
limit ourselves from what we can achieve
hmm okay you you bring you know raising
your kid up in the book quite a bit and
you talked about using these different
types of pressure to change his behavior
so what what are pressure mapping and
validation one of those two different
things yeah sure so pressure mapping is
is the notion after we of sort of
formalizing the the insights that we
have into promoting inhibiting pressures
right and so if I you know want to get
my son to go to sleep right what are all
of the things that might make him less
likely to go to sleep like light and
sound right and what are all the things
that make him more likely to go to sleep
like being tired
right or you know being full and so you
know what you’re doing when you’re when
you’re writing out this sort of
promoting inhibiting pressures is you
know mapping giving yourself a map to to
sort of formalize those pieces so that
you then can build interventions against
it right because if I say you know the
next step that comes after that right is
if I can if I say well you know light
isn’t inhibiting pressure and sound is
an inhibiting pressure then it becomes
fairly obvious that what I need to do is
get blackout curtains and ana noise
machine right and so the intervention is
derived from the pressures sure sure
yeah and I’m glad you brought that up
that’s the that’s the next on my list of
questions but you you open the chapter
with a description of how creativity and
the pursue not novelty can derail the
process of intervention design how how
does that work yeah and so I think you
know we sort of talked about this
touched on it very briefly earlier right
one of the hobgoblins is that we have
have become vastly over anchored as a
society on the sort of like sexy
interesting creative approach to a thing
right but often you know sort of the
boring is very effective at changing
behavior right making it so that you
there’s nothing particularly sexy about
being able to get out of a car without
paying right
you know payment is not a sexy space and
yet payment innovation can very
powerfully change our behavior right and
so I think that when people pursue the
novel instead of the effective it can
often lead them to sort of you know fall
in love with ideas that are not very
good at actually changing behavior right
no sometimes novelty changes behavior
it’s not that you know novel is always
bad but novelty itself is very unlikely
to change behavior things don’t get
different just because the solution is
is you know sort of sexy and attractive
right things get different because they
do right that’s a beautiful thing about
science is that the goal and the measure
are the same right meaning if the
Gorillaz behavior change and what you
measure is behavior change
then you don’t have to worry how
attractive something is or rather like
you and I don’t have to get in intubate
whether a or B is better because there’s
a there’s an absolute ruler for doing
that right we can measure how much
better a or B is because when we’ve
articulated a behavior in a way of that
measuring that behavior then all we have
to do is deploy a and B and observe
which one creates the behavior right huh
I mean I find that fascinating I mean it
that’s that’s really curious it seems
like that works against the grain
because you know when I think about
designing something I’m thinking about
how to make it attractive and sexy I’m
not thinking about okay how can we make
this more boring right yeah I mean but
but one of the things that’s really
interesting is like not everything we
want attention on right we want to spend
attention very carefully and so you know
when we try to make everything
attractive and sexy like you know uber
is a fair example here since we’re using
it all night long like ubers a fair
example here because like uber works
really well when you don’t think about
uber at all right the perfect version
like let’s not run it uber killer let’s
say you said to me Mac okay let’s go
design the thing that’s better than uber
I would go build many many many
integrations so that you never had to
think about uber ever again instead of
taking out the app and telling it where
you are and where you want to go I would
you know I don’t know build it on top of
your calendar so that as soon as you
were done the ubirr just pulled up right
and it automatically knew where your
next thing was because it had predictive
AI and figured all that out for you and
so you never had to think about it right
which is really in some ways what uber
did right you know as a we talked about
how freaking travelers right so before
Ober I had to rent a car I had to have a
map right you know before smartphones I
don’t printed out a map right MapQuest
directions right I had to think oh I
just spend tremendous mental energy to
the to getting from A to B and now if
it’s a major city I could just kind of
assume that uber can get me from A to B
and so all I really need to know is
where I am and where I want to go right
and so the way to then iterate on that
and improve is to make it so that I
don’t even have to know where I am
I want to go all of that is taken care
of for me wow that’s fascinating I mean
it reminds me of I was reading about
Steve Jobs and part of the technique
that he used to create sort of more
mental energy so that he could create it
was just reducing the number of
decisions that he made in any given day
so which is why you see him wearing sort
of the same turtleneck every single day
is because he’s just removing that
energy expenditure you know that so his
brain doesn’t have to make that decision
anymore and so I mean it’s that part of
the process just eliminating that
inconvenience of having to think about
you know doing something well it’s
interesting right because sometimes
inconvenience you know causes us to have
epiphanies right and so I for example at
Microsoft when I worked there I was
there were people who were like oh we
should have free lunch like Google has
free lunch and I was like no because if
we do that we will never create any of
the things that make lunch easier right
because for other people right will
never create you know automatic payment
if you’ve never experienced the pain of
paying you never create automatic
payment right you have to experience
unpleasantness in their world but that
said you know I do think and and you
know Steve Jobs was was one practitioner
of this but I think there been many
right you know Obama got rid of blue
suits right so that he didn’t have to
tell the difference between black and
blue which can be quite hard to do and
suiting like there are many examples of
people doing this I for example I don’t
wear the same thing every day I just
thought I I went a step farther I just
automatically on eBay that just buys
like John Varvatos 40-hour Blazers below
a certain price point well they just my
computer buys them and puts them in my
closet and presto
right like I wear the same thing every
day it’s not exactly the same thing but
it was all bought by a computer for me
right I often think about there’s a the
movie training day and there’s a great
scene where Ethan Hawke’s character who
you know has been sort of tricked into
getting high by buttons on Washington
yeah yeah so denzel sort of tricks me to
getting high and they go to visit this
older cop right and you know ethan hawke
sort of slumped in a chair
kind of
and Denzel and the older copper talking
kind of about the secret of the streets
and sort of hi Ethan pipes like I know
the streets and you know
Denzel yeah shut up man and but the
older cops like an island I’m talking
and and what he says is you know the
secret is to control your smiles and
cries control your smiles and cries and
that I always think has had a lot of
effect on me I was very interested in
you know the sort of recipe for
happiness is controlling what things you
allow to make you happy or unhappy right
you have some control over that right
the beautiful thing I was talking to a
friend of mine yesterday who happens to
run international business development
for Conde Nast and therefore VOC and so
he’s very fashionable and we were
talking about my sort of automating my
clothing I said one of the things that
is beautiful about it is if the guy and
we were we were sitting in a hotel bar I
said if the guy next to me spills his
drink all over this you know he is
brightly colored drink all over this all
over this jacket and stains it that’s
okay because it only cost me twenty
dollars and it was already reset you
know like it was reused when I got it
right meaning because it was clothing
yeah and so I don’t have a negative
environmental impact if I literally
throw it away and I have a very small I
cannot make impact on myself whereas if
this was I shall repay this blazer that
I bought do for $1000 sure right now I
have to take it to the dry cleaners
which is terrible for the environment I
have to feel bad for the rest of my day
I gotta get a fight with this guy in a
bar he feels bad I feel bad I lost a
bunch of money I gotta take it to a
dragn it’s like it’s a negative
experience all around right I have the
ability to control those things that are
brought to me and I’m not suggesting
that you shouldn’t care about anything I
think people sometimes hear this story
and what they take from that is well no
one should care about their clothes no
what I’m saying is if clothes are
incredibly important to you you should
make that a focal point of your life
spend your time and your money and your
mental energy there I think that’s
important but if they’re not don’t my
you know the Contra example is I built
every desktop computer I’ve owned since
I was you know 15 years old and I would
never let someone else build my computer
I like that process I I do sweat that I
do sweat it I spend way too much money
it you know I do get sad when it breaks
right like I I do sweat those things
because it gives me pleasure the act of
doing that is part of my animus and so
you know I think thinking carefully
about what you you know what you want to
allow to have impact in your life is
really critical and important I want my
kid to be able to both make me
incredibly happy and incredibly sad yeah
and that’s that’s a desirable end State
for me I mean it makes a lot of sense it
fits we’re running short on time so I
apologize if I’m speeding through these
priming moderation mediation you know
you get into this in your book so you
know what what do each of these mean you
don’t have to rush but what do these
mean and and what you know what is
required of us to sort of understand
them and that’s a really hard one to
explain these shortly so probably so
mediation moderation are statistical
terms for how you know sort of some
mathematical relationships between
variables work but basically the notion
here is that what matters for behavioral
change is sometimes you you will have to
create new pathways right you can create
a direct connection between for example
and identity in a behavior and sometimes
you have to go through another third
point in between right so meaning you
know the identity is correlated with
with you know the third point and the
behavior is correlated with the third
point and so there is a connection
between the identity and the behavior
but only as a monotheist it’s moderated
through through this third point and so
understanding the the causal
relationships versus the correlational
relationships between things can help
you build better things hmm okay okay
how important is the ethical check when
we’re talking about IDP okay so the
ethical check is is absolutely vital
right so as you noted in the book there
is a chapter on ethics I believe very
strongly that behavioral science
behavioral science is is morally
agnostic right the ability to change
behaviors is not good or bad right so
people use
I haven’t get it getting you know sort
of interviewed and people are like well
you’re manipulating people and I’m like
well manipulation is about like
manipulation itself like is is agnostic
right for example when I say my son
manipulates those Legos he’s not like
morally offending the Legos right it’s
just literally he’s moving them that’s
what manipulation means and so behavior
science itself is agnostic instead what
is key is how you use it and you know as
I frequently point out to people like
you don’t want to get on my bad side
right like if you go to war you don’t
want to be on the other side of me and
so cuz I’ve been doing this a really
long time and so if what you do is read
my book and use it to you know sell
sugar water to kids hmm I can’t stop you
from doing that but I can fight you and
I will and so you know the ethical to
chuck is about making sure that when we
change behavior we change it in a way
that someone if you made obvious the
behavior you know it doesn’t require
that you always make obvious the
behavior change it what it requires is
that if you did make obvious that
behavior change the person would agree
to it and if you I think if you made
obvious to someone you know the
devastating effects of selling sugar
what are the kids they would not agree
to it and thus that is not a an ethical
use of behavior okay I’m not sure if you
mentioned I wanted you to cover this the
the different gaps in tension action gap
and the intention goal gap sure yeah so
let’s use the flu shot as a really great
example so the intention action gap is
what we usually talk about in social
psychology I mean to go to the gym I
don’t go to the gym man right like you
know there I have the intention of doing
something but I don’t actually do it but
there is another kind of gap that we
don’t often look at that is actually
incredibly important which is you know
sort of the the you know action outcome
gap so where I don’t I never had the
intention of doing things in the thing
in the first place despite the fact that
I wanted that outcome right so with a
flu shot there’s a difference between i
man I meant to get a flu shot but I just
didn’t get a flu shot right I was busy
or they were out of it when I got there
or I had to pay money that I wasn’t
acting right those are all you know a
sort of intention action gaps right
intended I didn’t need you but there are
also people who don’t want to get the
flu but have no intention of getting the
flu shot right an intention outcome
Gavin and and that’s a huge problem
right and too often we assume things our
intention in action gaps right everyone
wants to get the flu shot and they just
don’t do it though some people genuinely
have no intention of doing it but they
don’t want to get the flu and so that’s
an opportunity to help change their
behavior and help them recognize you
know where the behaviors that they have
aren’t gonna get them where they want to
go hmm okay okay so you know after the
ethical check comes the testing period
where you know how can you describe what
a pilot is and you know how it would
vary in size and scope yeah so so we
talked about pilot testing scale right
so piloting is you know running very
very small and you’re just trying to see
if there’s anything even there right is
this a valid route to changing a
behavior so you’re still measuring
behavior change you’re probably not
going to get statistical significance
you know the the sort of rule of thumb
sometimes that I always you know sort of
use and it changes a lot depending what
the behavior is and so I don’t want to
get people to get over lang chord on
this but you know a pilot is 20 people a
test is 200 people you know a scale is
two million people right and the idea is
you know you try lots of things on 20
people you relatively fewer on 200
people and then very few one on two
million people and so but the purpose of
pilot so people often are tempted to
skip out on that step right because you
know they want to rush to the two
million and and many things are never
tested at all I just rolled out to the
two million and and I think you will
learn really interesting things from
piloting right and I think a lot of harm
could be avoided if we first make sure
that things actually create the behavior
we want okay so getting to the the final
stages of IDP which you talked about
something called the Parana effect what
is yeah what is that how does it relate
to sort of the affective cognitive
attention what is the Parana effect yeah
so the Parana effect is this
this sort of notion accorded by a
psychologist I anticipated up all of the
interventions often they would they
would equal more than 100 percent right
so imagine I have three different
interventions and intervention a is
about fifty percent effective at getting
people to do something and intervention
P is about forty percent effective at
getting people to do something the
intervention C is about thirty percent
effective at doing something well math
you know in our minds were like a plus B
plus B forty percent plus you know fifty
percent plus forty percent plus thirty
percent one hundred twenty percent right
it should make everybody do the thing
but in reality if I deploy ABC you’ll
get to fifty percent and the reason is
that you know a was clear the best
intervention but you know a plus B you
know they cannibalize each other a
little bit that’s where we get the
Parana they you know sort of swim around
and eat each other and so when we talk
about something of like you know mental
attention you know I could deploy all
the anti-smoking things I want but
they’re not gonna get me to 100%
anti-smoking because they sort of
compete with each other for your
attention and sometimes sometimes less
is more
that’s why pilot testing and scaling is
so important right is because you know I
I’m not just trying to find something
that works I’ve tried to find something
that works given all of the other things
that are also currently working right
because very often you know once you
deploy it you’ll find that you know the
sort of juice is worth the squeeze yeah
it incrementally makes it slightly
better but not the massive thing that
you saw in sort of scaling very sort of
in piloting and so I think that’s why
you know you really need to manage your
portfolio of intervention as well
because you know a company isn’t one
intervention it’s thousands of
interventions it’s a million tiny
decisions that we make and can change
and they all compete with each other and
so we need to to view them and practice
them in harmony even if we sort of test
them in isolation
so I mean would there be one part of
this process that is more important than
the other or is the whole process sort
of key here you know I would say I’ll
answer that I’ll answer that in the
framework of the book itself right
so meaning if what we wanted if the
intention of the book is to get people
to you know create things that change
behavior the all of the things in the
book are important interventions towards
doing that but by far the single thing
that will have the most effect is
getting people to write a behavioral
statement consciously articulate the
behavior you are in fact trying to
change you know we could take this show
for a second right like have you
actually really thought down sat down
Savior and thought about okay when
someone listens to my show what do I
want them to do differently hmm right
this interview will be a failure if
people walk away from it and they don’t
behave differently hmm right and so you
know everything else sort of falls away
in comparison to the critical critical
point of spending time articulating what
we want people to do yeah I love that I
wholly agree on that point um you know I
I know Matt I know that there are you
know startup founders that follow you
and it you know it almost seems like
some of these kids are kind of looking
for this secret code that’s hidden
somewhere and it’s gonna solve this
formula of how to make them their
company succeed maybe but I mean do you
do you have any advice for them do you
any and we’re about to we’re about to
end the show and is there anything that
you want to touch on that we didn’t
cover maybe man what would I share with
them we talked a little bit about it but
I think I’ll go and sort of close to
where we started which is the beautiful
and powerful thing about behavior change
in the focus on behavior changes that it
levels the playing field right in a
world where we don’t focus on behavior
change basically whoever has the biggest
ad budget wins right and and you can
pick whatever your version of ad budget
is most followers on Twitter you know
knows natural beauty or biggest boobs or
I don’t care read and like pick
your thing right
whatever raw natural resource draws
attention
they win and I’m not cool I’m not
particularly physically attractive you
know I’m a very rural part of the
country I’m a first-generation college
kid power there is immense power in in
and an egalitarian power in behavior
change and so if I you know there was
something that the young entrepreneurs
of the world you know took away from
this I I what I would hope it would be
is that they can have power in the world
they can create change and that can be
big change small change it be whatever
kind of change they want to create if
they are you know thoughtful about what
is the impact that they want to have
right and so you know I set out to write
this book what I decided was that what I
wanted my legacy to be was empowering
people to create behavior change and so
I got very very focused on doing the
things I needed to do to make it
possible for other people to to create
behavior change and I think whoever you
are out there whoever needs to hear this
you know you have the power to change
behavior your own and others and I hope
you use that wisely and thoughtfully and
and not only ethically but also in a way
that brings you a satisfactory and and
sort of lovely life and hopefully in a
way that makes the world a better place
right yeah 100% I mean as I said you
know I think you are free to use it
however you want but it is always a
useful thing to say if I do this who
will I put on the other side of the
table from me you know there’s the old
the old ethical check that everyone uses
which is I would I be ashamed to tell my
mother about this right I think that
that you know thinking really
thoughtfully about who am i aligning
myself against and with particularly in
this time at least in the US where you
know we are I don’t know that I think
that I agree that we’re in more divided
country than we’ve ever been before
although people like to say that but I
think we people are displaying their
beliefs
you know in very obvious and visible
ways in a way that you know you have to
be very thoughtful about about what
you’re gonna create in the world now
more than ever it is so important what
you’re gonna create a new for and and I
hope you use that thoughtfully but but
you know it’s been a lot of fun to talk
to the Savior and I appreciate you
taking the time and fighting me on what
do you want to talk about that we didn’t
get to talk about I mean I think we
covered you know pretty much every want
everything that I wanted to touch on in
this conversation I really enjoyed it as
well you know it kind of flew by how do
I see your last name
because you you didn’t it’s perfectly
okay wonderfully I first of all I don’t
really know how to say it it’s French
Belgian and you know is funny I gave a
talk at the French Embassy maybe a year
or so ago ironically actually the very
night I found out that the the the that
I was offered the book deal they like
called me in the middle of the party and
said you know we want to offer you this
thing you should check your email
amazing but it was an amazing party
because everyone said my last name
perfectly and beautiful right like you
know everywhere I go no one really knows
how to say it including me and then
there’s this room full of people who are
like oh well yeah it’s so nice to meet
you I’m like oh that’s amazing
nobody’s asking it’s beautiful but it so
you know Americans mostly say it Wohlers
I’m sure it’s something beautiful in
French like wow yeah or something like I
don’t know so you know that guy that guy
usually worked that guy over there the
behavioral science guy you know
hilarious man it’s really fun to talk to
you Matt where do people find your work
if they don’t know about you website
yeah everything is just my name it’s
Matt Waller calm and I met while I on
Twitter and all those sorts of things
and and you know one of the things that
is a little bit different about me is I
I don’t believe in double opt-in intros
or any of those sorts of things which
easy sort of insist on these days I try
and keep an open calendar and so there
is a link on my website on LinkedIn
other places where if you feel like you
need to talk to me you can book a
30-minute slot it’s free I’m happy to
talk to you you know it sometimes it’s
booked six months in advance so you may
have to be a little patient but but you
know you can you can
my time and I will find time whatever it
is you’re struggling with whatever you
know help you need please use one of
those channels whether it’s booking a
call or Twitter or sending me an email
or whatever it is to ask for that help I
think you know underrepresented folks
people from backgrounds that that aren’t
necessarily privileged they don’t learn
to ask for help because you know it’s a
you know totally rational way by the way
I don’t think it’s a rational actor
problem they don’t ask for help because
so often they have not gotten it or no
they won’t get it but the problem is as
you grow in power you necessarily need
help from other people and so you know I
invite you to take this opportunity that
if you do need help you know as Xavier
asked me ask someone for the help that
you need
amazing I love that Matt what a pleasure
to just hang out with you and talk about
this it it was really fun and that’s
such a huge service that you’re offering
to people guys we’re gonna get out of
here but this what an amazing interview
my guest
Matt Wohlers and the book is called
start at the end how to build products
that create change thank you guys so
much for listening if you made it this
far and make sure you click like and
subscribe to the show if you’re
listening to this on YouTube if you’re
listening on the podcast please get over
to iTunes leave us a review good or bad
we really learned from those I really
learned from them as well so yeah thank
you so much for being here and next week
we have dr. Bruce Lipton I’ve been
sending him emails for six years so it’s
gonna be a really good show that’s on
Tuesday next week thank you guys so much
for being here
good night