1. Confirmation bias
We believe what we want to believe by focusing on information that confirms our beliefs or preconceived ideas.
This leads us to look for new solutions that confirm our beliefs rather than questioning them.
Be careful when you disagree with the data provided by the team or when you dismiss it!
2. False causality
Cite sequential events as evidence that the former caused the latter. This can happen as part of the empathy phase of Design Thinking, where you intentionally seek to confirm causality between what people say and what they do, leading you to take on the wrong problems or needs to solve them.
Ask yourself the question: can you really prove causation? Or just correlation? Or just the sequence?
3. Compliance bias
The choices of mass populations influence the way we think, even if this goes against independent personal judgments. This can result in poor decision-making and lead to groupthink, which is particularly detrimental to creativity because outside opinions can be suppressed, leading to self-censorship and the loss of independent thought.
When you spot collective thinking within a team, first try to get everyone's personal perspective separately (either through silent, written brainstorming or one-on-one exchanges) before discussing the topic as a team.
4. A bias in favor of innovation
New innovations should be adopted by all members of society (regardless of wider needs) and are pushed and accepted at all costs. Novelties are considered to be intrinsically good, regardless of potential negative impacts (inequality, elitism, environmental damage, etc.), which means that the new ideas and new concepts generated are judged through glasses that are slightly tinged with pink.
Question the idea:
Aren't we judging it too much by its degree of novelty? Is she sexy enough? Without falling into the bias of the status quo, do we take into account all possible impacts (also negative ones)?
5. Projection bias
According to behavioral economics, over-preparation of future tastes or preferences will correspond to current tastes or preferences.
This bias has a particular influence because new innovations are designed in the present and are projected to the future when they enter the markets, resulting in an overvaluation of consumer preferences.
6. Action bias
Faced with ambiguity, encourage doing something or anything without prior analysis, even if that is counterproductive.
Team members may feel that they need to take action regardless of whether the idea is good or not.
This can be a problem when they are under time pressure in strict design sprint workshops, for example.
When a team is in this situation, ask yourself if their actions have a clear rationale (why?) and whether they are based on evidence from the direction she has chosen. At the other end of the spectrum, avoid “analysis paralysis” by encouraging pragmatic decision-making based on partial evidence.
7. Strategic misrepresentation
Knowingly underestimating costs and overestimating benefits.
When developing innovation concepts, key figures, and business model prototypes, teams tend to underestimate real costs and overestimate likely benefits in order to get a project approved (which happens constantly in major government contracts). Excessive optimism is then identified and questioned by managers who assess the genuinely innovative nature of the team's results.
Challenge your teams: do they show the full picture of costs? What about ETPs and other time investments?
8. Anchoring bias
Be influenced by information that is already known or presented for the first time. This causes a pre-loaded and determined tunnel vision and influences final decision-making.
We deliberately manipulate the minds of team members by “pre-loading” one of our warm-up exercises to demonstrate this bias in play. The impact is very significant on creative thinking and results.
9. Authority bias
Promote the ideas of authority figures within innovation teams. This means that innovative ideas from senior team members outweigh all others, even though other concepts, ideas, and contributions might be more creative and relevant to solving the problem. Take this into account, especially when speaking yourself. What you say, as a sponsor, will carry much more weight than any other opinion.
10. A self-congratulatory bias
Promote decisions that strengthen self-esteem.
This leads to attributing positive events to oneself and, conversely, negative events to others. In innovation workshops, this can mean that decisions made can be loaded with a personal agenda rather than customer and business logic for the company.
Encourage team members (or yourself) to look at the idea from different perspectives (other departments, stakeholders, customers, etc.) to assess its merit objectively.
11. The bias of public opinion
Promote ideas that have already been adopted by others. This phenomenon is particularly influential when it is linked to authority bias. The ripple effect is a common phenomenon that we see in workshops.
The pace at which ideas are adopted by others (through discussion,...) can significantly influence the likelihood that these ideas and concepts will be selected by the group and implemented.
- Do you like an idea from the team just because you've seen it done before?
- Do you promote ideas just because other banks are doing them too?
12. The bias of the status quo
Prioritize the current situation or the status quo and maintain it because of aversion to loss (or fear of losing it) and do nothing about it.
It's a subtle emotional bias that leads us to reduce risks and prefer what's familiar or “the way we do things here,” as they say.
It has serious consequences when looking for new ways to solve needs and problems creatively.
When you don't like an idea, ask yourself, “Am I just sticking to what I know?”
13. The loss aversion bias
Once a decision has been made, stick to it rather than taking risks for fear of losing what you have gained by starting something and hoping to see it finished. We also value something more when we have made an emotional investment in it. Because of the effort, time, and energy spent on creative thinking, team members can become emotionally attached to their results. To remedy this, the 11th Commandment: “You will not fall in love with your solutions.”
14. Framing bias
Be influenced by how information is presented rather than by the information itself
We see this all the time, especially when developing prototypes for pitching as well as when presenting neat slides.
People will avoid the risk if it is well presented and look for the risk if it is poorly presented, which means that decision-making logic can easily be skewed.
When you're judging a team's pitch, are you judging the content? Or the service?
15. Ambiguity bias
Promote options whose results are easier to know than those that are not.
This bias has disastrous consequences for innovation results, as the process is fundamentally risky and unknown.
If team members subconsciously favor known options, you will most likely follow known options and paths already taken.
When you don't like an idea or a way of working, think for a second. Is it based on merit or simply because it is new and unknown?
16. Positive effect of the characteristic
(closely linked to the optimism bias): Because of limited time or resources, people tend to focus on the “good” benefits while ignoring the negative effects, even when these are significant.
This is influential when it comes to diving into specific sets of new features for new concepts (especially when combined with the loss aversion bias), because it means that teams will overlook missing information, especially when it comes to outside expertise, which will have the effect of pushing ideas with critical flaws forward.
