One More Minute with Daniel Pink

Reading Daniel Pink is like reading the Bible. I have to stop every couple of pages and think long and hard about what I just read and how I can make it stick in my thinking and life.

Pink cites Michael Pantalon, a research scientist at Yale School of Medicine, as a leading authority on “motivational interviewing.” His technique seeks to spark behavioral change by tapping people’s inner drives. For example, try to motivate your daughter to study for an important upcoming test.

Question 1: “On a scale of 1 to 10, how ready are you to study?”

After she answers, you ask another question.

Question 2: Why didn’t you pick a lower number?

The question catches her off guard. (So much better than a yes-no question.) She moves from defending her current actions to articulating her personal motives for studying, which increases the chances she actually will.

Questions like this show that a jolt of the unfamiliar can jar us out of the ruts in our thinking into new patterns that might produce new and better results.

In the old days, sales people provided access to information for their clients. Now virtually all the information is available on the internet. Today in sales, sales people prove their usefulness to clients when they curate the information available. Studies show that we encounter about 100,000 words per day – advertisements, emails, blogs, Facebook posts, twitter, text messages, conversations at home, TV shows, mailings, etc. The key job of the sales person today is helping clients wade through the mass of material and help them select what’s relevant and what’s not.

The ultimate pitch for an era of short attention spans begins with one word and doesn’t go any further. What is that one word that describes your business? Attention spans aren’t merely shrinking, they’re nearly disappearing. Pink says, “The only way to be heard is to push brevity to its breaking point.” He continues,  “When anybody thinks of you, they utter that word.” Nowadays only the brutally simple ideas get through.

Daniel Pink, To Sell is Human, p. 146-161

Potential Counts More Than Accomplishment?

How can that be?  Daniel Pink’s engaging book “To Sell is Human” discusses this topic, citing research from a 2012 publication by Jayson Jia of Stanford and Michael Norton of the Harvard Business School.

The natural inclination says the way to go is to focus on the deals done, divisions turned around and awards collected. However, the authors suggest emphasizing potential.

The researchers tested this by testing NBA general managers who were evaluating two players and how much to pay them. The first basketball player was an experienced athlete with outstanding statistics who had been in the league for five seasons.  On the other side was a rookie (no NBA experience) who had the potential to product similar results.

The veteran player was offered a salary of over $4 million for his sixth year.

But, the general managers said they would expect to pay more than $5 million for the rookie in his sixth season.  Potential was rewarded over past performance.

In another test, researchers tested the Facebook ads for two comedians. Half the ads said, “Kevin Shea could be the next big thing.”  The other ad said that Kevin Shea “is the next big thing.” The first ad, emphasizing potential,  generated  far more click throughs and likes than the second.

The scholars commented on the research saying, “The potential to be good at something can be preferred over actually being good at that very same thing.”

Pink concludes from the researcher’s position, “People often find potential more interesting than accomplishment because it’s more uncertain. The uncertainty can lead people to think more deeply about the person they’re evaluating.  This more intensive processing can generate more and better reasons why the person is a good choice.”

Daniel Pink, To Sell is Human, p. 140-141.