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miete ("thought") + lause ("phrase")

count: 67

filter: title = Made to Stick clear

Made to Stick (Chip Heath)

"A friend of a friend..." Have you ever noticed that our friends' friends have much more interesting lives than our friends themselves?
page: 4
tags: telephone game urban legends
Is it possible to make __true, worthwhile__ ideas circulate as effectively as false, more inherently interesting, ideas?
page: 5
tags: ideas
Not every idea is stick-worthy, but the ones that are, we want to stick in a way that themes and ways of thinking endure long after the individual factoids have faded.
page: 9
tags: themes ideas
If you have to tell someone the same thing ten times, the idea probably wasn't very well designed.
page: 9
tags: design ideas
Most of the time, you only get one shot to get an idea to stick. So how do you know, __in advance__, which way will stick?
page: 10
tags: ideas
1. To strip an idea down to its core, we must be masters of exclusion. We must relentlessly prioritize. We must create ideas that are both simple __and__ profound.
page: 16
tags: conveying ideas
2. To get our audience's attention, we need to violate their expectations. We need to be counterintuitive. We just generate interest and curiosity. Open gaps in their knowledge, then fill those gaps.
page: 16
tags: conveying ideas
3. Speak concretely to make your idea clear, in terms of human actions and sensory information. Use concrete images. "A bird in the hand..."
page: 17
tags: conveying ideas
4. Give the audience something to consider for themselves rather than passing ideas down from on high. Ask a question intended to make them consider and weigh and judge.
page: 17
tags: conveying ideas
5. Use their emotion. Make them feel something. Disgust, anger. We are wired to feel things for people, not for abstract ideas.
page: 17
tags: conveying ideas
6. Tell stories. Stories act as a kind of mental flight simulator, providing us with a catalog of others' experiences, and preparing us to respond more quickly and effectively.
page: 18
tags: conveying ideas
One of the main problems with trying to get an idea to stick is the curse of knowledge. Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. It becomes difficult for us to share our knowledge with others, because we can't readily re-create our listeners' state of mind.
page: 20
tags: knowledge
There are only two ways to beat the curse of knowledge: don't learn anything, or take your ideas and transform them by following the sticky ideas checklist. (conveying ideas tag, 1-6)
page: 20
tags: knowledge ideas
"All happy families resemble each other, but each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."
page: 23
tags: happiness family
"A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away."
page: 28
tags: design perfection
Simple doesn't mean easy, dumbed down. It means elegance and prioritization.
page: 30
tags: simple prioritization
The first sentence of a news article should contain most essential elements of the story. This is called a lead. The information gets gradually less critical further in the story. This is the inverted pyramid structure. This means a reader with a short attention span will get most of the information someone with a longer attention span would and also makes editing for brevity easier, as you can just lob off the bottom of the piece without losing critical information.
page: 30
tags: leads story
Smart people recognize the value of all the material. They see nuance, multiple perspectives--and because they fully appreciate the complexities of a situation, they're often tempted to linger there. This tendency to gravitate toward complexity is perpetually at war with the need to prioritize.
page: 32
tags: prioritization complexity
If you say three things, you don't say anything.
page: 34
tags: focus prioritization
Giving someone two alternatives to something, rather than one, paradoxically makes them less likely to choose either.
page: 37
tags: choice
The more we reduce the amount of information in an idea, the stickier it will be.
page: 46
tags: ideas
Someone wants to add a new feature. Other engineers in a team don't particularly care about the feature, but they don't care enough to stage a protest. This slowly and quietly leads to feature creep.
page: 49
tags: feature creep
When we remember complex subjects, it's because we have already done the heavy lifting of learning and organizing the data in our minds, and all we need to access it is a pointer to that information. To make an idea stick, you tap the existing memory terrain of your audience, and use what's already there.
page: 52
tags: notes
Rather than electrons orbiting nuclei, it's more accurately described as a probability cloud. But we teach sixth graders the orbit model because it nudges them closer to the truth rather than clouds which are impossible to understand. The choice is between accuracy and accessibility, but if a message can't be used to make predictions or decisions, no matter how accurate or comprehensive it is, it is without value. An accurate but useless idea is still useless.
page: 56
tags: accuracy accessibility
An accurate but useless idea is still useless. People are tempted to tell you everything, with perfect accuracy, right up front, when they should be giving you just enough info to be useful, then a little more, then a little more.
page: 57
tags: accuracy
A great way to avoid useless accuracy, and to dodge the curse of knowledge, is to use analogies. Analogies derive their power from schemas. They make it possible to understand a compact message because they invoke concepts that you already know.
page: 57
tags: curse of knowledge analogies
The most basic way to get someone's attention is to break a pattern. Humans adapt incredibly quickly to consistent patterns. Consistent sensory stimulation makes us tune out.
page: 64
tags: attention patterns adaptation simulation
Surprise makes us want to find an answer--to resolve the question of why we are surprised, why our schemas failed--and big surprises call for big answers. If we want to motivate people to pay attention, we should seize the power of big surprises.
page: 69
tags: surprise motivation
To be surprising and impactful, an event can't be predictable, but it MUST be post-dictable: it has to make sense if you think about it, but not something you would have seen coming.
page: 71
tags: surprise impact
If you want an idea to stick, you have to break someone's guessing machine (surprise them), and then fix it by producing insight by targeting an aspect of your audience's guessing machines that relates to your core message.
page: 71
tags: surprise insight
The Aha! experience is much more satisfying when it is preceded by the Huh? experience. Present a mystery, then help the reader solve it.
page: 81
tags: experience
Curiosity happens when we feel a gap in our knowledge. Domains like movies and novels intentionally create this gap to keep readers engaged. To convey knowledge, first convince your audience that they need that knowledge by opening a gap for them. Shift your thinking from "What information do I need to convey?" to "What questions do I want my audience to ask?"
page: 84
tags: knowledge curiosity
If people believe they know everything, it's hard to make the gap theory work. You have to disable their overconfidence. Make them commit to a prediction that you can prove false. Overconfident people would also be more likely to recognize a knowledge gap when they see that others disagree with them.
page: 88
tags: overconfidence
If curiosity arises from knowledge gaps, we might assume that when we know more, we'll become less curious because there are fewer gaps in our knowledge. But Loewenstein argues that the opposite is true. He says that as we gain information we are more and more likely to focus on what we don't know.
page: 89
There is value in sequencing information--not dumping a stack of information on someone at once but dropping a clue, then another clue, then another. This method of communication resembles flirting more than lecturing.
page: 93
tags: information communication sequencing
Trying to teach an abstract principle without concrete foundations is like trying to start a house by building a roof in the air.
page: 106
tags: abstract
Your brain is like Velcro; it has a staggering number of tiny loops on its storage compartments. An idea that has more hooks will adhere better to this storage.
page: 111
Novices perceive concrete details as concrete details. Experts perceive concrete details as symbols of patterns and insights that they have learned through years of experience. Experts want to talk about strategy and philosophy, not implementation and rules.
page: 114
tags: atag
It can feel unnatural to speak concretely about subject matter we've known intimately for years.
page: 115
tags: speaking concreteness
The pitch is generally delivered by the expert, who needs to use concrete, not abstract, terms to communicate with the audience, who are the novices (and probably the ones with the money).
page: 118
tags: pitch communication audience
We trust the recommendations of people whom we want to be like.
page: 134
tags: credibility
It can be the honesty and trustworthiness of our sources, not their status, that allows them to act as authorities on a subject.
page: 137
tags: authority honesty credibility
Urban legends (and other things) acquire a good deal of their credibility and effect from their localized details.
page: 138
tags: credibility
If someone can mentally see the vivid details attached to the story, they are more likely to believe the story, even if the details are irrelevant to the story.
page: 139
The most important thing to remember about using statistics effectively is that they are rarely meaningful in and of themselves. Statistics will, and should, almost always be used to illustrate a relationship. It's more important for people to remember the relationship than the number.
page: 143
If members of a soccer team had the same views of the goal as employees of companies do, only 4 of the 11 players on the field would know which goal is theirs. Only 2 of the 11 would care. Only 2 of the 11 would know what position they play and know exactly what they are supposed to do. And all but 2 players would, in some way, be competing against their own team members rather than the opponent.
page: 144
tags: human scale principle
Drop in the bucket effect. If people feel overwhelmed by the scale of the problem, their contributions seem meaningless.
page: 166
tags: impact effectiveness problems meaning
Thinking analytically reduces our capacity to feel while doing so.
page: 167
When associations to certain terms are drawn repeatedly--sometimes with precision, sometimes with crudeness--the effect is to dilute the power of the terms and their underlying concepts. When everyone paints with lime green, lime green no longer stands out.
page: 173
tags: semantic stretch
We make people care by appealing to things that matter to them. What matters to people? People matter to themselves. One reliable way of making people care is by invoking self-interest. Spell it out for them. Do the heavy lifting so they have time to absorb your point.
page: 177
tags: self-interest
It may be the tangibility, rather than the magnitude, of the benefits that makes people care. It may be enough to promise reasonable benefits that people can easily imagine themselves enjoying.
page: 182
While self-interest can be used to motivate, it may be trumped by what someone identifies as something someone like them would normally do in a given situation.
page: 190
tags: motivating self-interest group behavior identifying
Abraham Maslow, motivation pyramid (mostly junk, it's not a pyramid). Bottom 4 are Physical, Security, Belonging, Esteem. Next 4 are less concrete: Learning, Aesthetic, Self-actualization, Transcendence.
page: 183
Using stories allows people to follow along and imagine what they would do in the same situation. Stories are part entertainment and part instruction.
page: 208
tags: storytelling
Simulating past events is much more helpful than simulating future outcomes.
page: 211
When we imagine events or sequences we evoke the same modules of the brain that are evoked in real physical activity. Mental practice alone produces about two thirds of the benefits of actual physical practice.
page: 212
tags: practice simulation
Stories put knowledge into a framework that is more lifelike, more true to our day-to-day existence.
page: 214
tags: stories knowledge
We don't always have to create sticky ideas. Spotting them is often easier and more useful.
page: 224
When you make an argument, you're implicitly asking people to evaluate your argument--judge it, debate it, criticize it--and then argue back, at least in their minds. But with a story you engage the audience--you are involving people with the idea, asking them to participate with you. Tell a story that elicits a second story from the little voice in their heads.
page: 234
The problem with trying to convey the edifice of all of your knowledge is that you can't fit it all in one 90-minute presentation. At best you can pluck a few building blocks from the roof, which results in meaningless recommendations and platitudes and inauthentic one-liners.
page: 236
tags: knowledge speaking
Stories have the amazing dual power to simulate and to inspire. And most of the time we don't even have to use much creativity to harness these powers--we just need to be ready to spot the good ones that life generates every day.
page: 237
tags: writing stories
The world will always produce more great ideas than any single individual, even the most creative one.
page: 242
tags: ideas creativity
People who are captivating speakers typically do no better than others in making their ideas stick--it's the stories that stick, regardless of the speaker.
page: 243
tags: ideas stories speaking
One of the worst things about knowing a lot, or having access to a lot of information, is that we're tempted to share it all. We bury the lead.
page: 243
tags: lead
Curse of Knowledge. Knowing a lot helps us get to the answer, but hurts us when telling others the answer. We tend to communicate __as if our audience were us__. There's a curious disconnect between the amount of time we invest in training people how to arrive at the answer and the amount of time we invest in training them how to tell others.
page: 245
SUCCESs easy reference guide.
page: 253
as a writing exercise, go through the clinics