2023

Rude Boss Analysis

More is lost through indecision

Advertising mirrors our collective concerns

Vapourware CEOs

Rebranding: the go-to panacea of ineffective leadership

Creativity in therapy

Three brain modes

A commonality-seeking mindset and difficult conversations

2022

The psychology of pricing

Two modes of working

How to inspire creativity/innovation in your team

Engaging with diverse peoples and cultures

2021

Connection distance affects how we perceive contrary information

Risk assessment and prevailing social narratives

Conspiracism: likelihood and loci of change

Cognitive styles that perpetuate conspiracism

Existing beliefs that predict conspiracism

Individual conditions that predispose conspiracism

Situational desires that predict conspiracism

Perception management: phone use at meetings and lectures

Bonuses reward the wrong type of performance

Die in certainty, or thrive in uncertainty?

Reducing the emotional attachment load in problems

Un-scaring as a Service

Four facets of problem-solving

Quality: Knowing when to stop

The permission to do less

2020

Possibility, Likelihood, Magnitude, and Multitude

You are right

How ‘collective narcissism’ is directing world politics

Making excuses for poor leadership

Why believers force their beliefs on others

Impossible conversations in the age of instant outrage

The perils of buying upward

Evil clients and systems designed to fail

Age of delusion

Blame in problem-solving

Panic-buying behaviours in business management

Composing constructive criticism

Criticism is not (always) insult

JotterPad customer experience fail

Psychological safety in Agile

2019

Suing parents; on alternate uncomfortable views

Contain and excise anxiety from self-esteem

Visualising Imposter Syndrome anxiety

Happiness from a simple business transaction

Simplistic polarisation impedes problem-solving

2018

Luck vs fate

That Google Duplex demo

Top tip for working with a difficult person

Interrogation vs Inquiry

Agency in UX design

De-conflation in problem-solving

Two reasons to leave

Enable individuals over systems

From data to insights and strategy

Visualising antidepressants

Don’t judge: “always on their phones”

A big psychological step forward for robocars

Finite f*cks to give

2017

Elements which may be offensive

Too senior to be accountable

Entitlement to voice suffering

Continuum of customer service care factor

Three obstacles to constructive discourse

Thank those who go the extra mile, because it probably cost them

Can your business bank help (with innovation)?

What we pay attention to

Empathy in electronic communications

Incremental acceptance of the unacceptable

Fakery gives permission

Asking the wrong questions of politicians

Ill-differentiated triggers

Golden opportunity or trickery?

Constructive versions of lying techniques

EQ visualised

2016

Four lessons in social manipulation from the 2016 US elections

Five self-awareness lessons from the 2016 US elections

Problems in an ego-driven business

The time for grassroots action is now

Why ego-driven businesses fail

Post-traumatic growth

Some problems are insoluble

The pros and cons of being nice

Asking open questions for deeper richer responses

The importance of being healthy selfish

$500 census server

Talent-Belief gap

Action-Impact gap

Over-marketing?

Anxiety blocks creativity

Mechanistic Processes vs Guiding Principles

When strong emotions override communications

Constructive dream or escapist fantasy?

Engaging the brain to help the heart

Ambiguity can be a strength too

Five steps to tyranny

Making THEM change

Society slow to respond to threats

Millennials lack social skills

Ideals vs perfectionism

Inclusiveness and mental dexterity

Indicating and (maybe) not turning

On-trend is myopic

No one succeeds on their own

Optimal anxiety

Stop nagging already

2015

Leadership fishtanks

Social media is not advertising

Empathy in customer service

Get Sh*t Done!

Let them win

If we were our own client

What drives a closed mind?

Sparse info; more weight?

Viennese traffic lights

Un-extraordinary Vertu

Live your dream: a tableau

Doing matters

Behaviour change and anxiety

Why nice people do dreadful things

Missing from Amsterdam

Graffiti citizen engagement

Beliefs, assumption and acceptance

Getting customer experience right first time

History changing objects

Children need less food

How we make meaning

Knowledge transfer vs construction

Design + applied psychology: A hybrid problem solving process

Rapport in 10

Avoiding suffering

From big external to small internal

Global awareness, personal power

Helping people build loyalty

The normalisation of sociopathy

Audacity vs arrogance

We get what we venerate

Five Gamification Techniques for Business

Commitment and happiness

Weeding the lawn

Wilful ignorance about the Internet

Reframing for new perspectives

Lifeline skills in consulting - Part IV

Lifeline skills in consulting - Part III

Lifeline skills in consulting - Part II

Lifeline skills in consulting - Part I

2014

Captain Hindsight

Escaping the status quo

Design thinkers and the MBTI

Two things the world need today

Time and B/W thinking

Black and white thinking

Holding up the lifts

Group size matters

False certainties

Safety and positive affect in problem solving

Designing for motivation

Designing for happiness

Evil Eights

Failure: two views

Breaking through illusions

On quiet cities

Buffet traffic

Listening to transform crises and conflict

Selflessness vs selfishness in negotiations

Maintaining the experience

Working with the nature of things

BS Detector

Fear Uncertainty Doubt

Happy medium age!

Assumptions and fantasies

Industry habits and expectations

Leading by example not

Reacting without thinking

Connections

Respond to covertly aggressive manipulation

Solving the wrong problem

Solving non-problems

The dark side of expertise

Context is king

The cheap and the entitled

Feelings vs reality

Perceptive relativity

Read me!

Vaclav Smil nuggets

Maybe you need a project designer?

Permission to tool up

Context, relevance and richness

Confidence vs arrogance

Judgement vs discernment

Acceptance vs acquiescence

Detachment and problem solving

2013

Whole-self, not wholesale

Faulty thinking

Death by deliberation

Facts, emotions and crises

A unifying vision

Not quite unwrapping

Blind beliefs

Work is serial monogamy

Personal responsibility

CEOs out of touch with reality?

Pain and invoicing for work

Perceiving others’ pain

Aging and problem focus

Active listening: two ways

The voices within

Practical wisdom

Easy to use

Control

Distractions

Hardwired to Make Meaning

Emotional intelligence (EQ) primer

The Cycle of Abuse in the workplace

Co-design vs design by committee

Killing inspiration

Four traits of collaborative leaders

Narcissistic leadership

Narcissistic organisations: characteristics & risks

Cultural tolerance and creativity

Hofstede’s Uncertainty Avoidance Index

Consumption and creation

New social opportunities in online communications

New resource: UI, UX, IA and Gamification in Context

Analogue fault-tolerance

Purpose Identity Meaningfulness Satisfaction

The people component in complex problems

Sangfroid

A safe place for challenging conversations

A matter of will

Evolution by stealth

2012

Social tools and intimacy

Ethics and value judgements

Change: the collective vs the individual

Emotional obstacles

Dehydrating complex situations

What price for business success

Beliefs and care factor

Spotting truth amongst the lies

Copyright and innovation

New resource: EQ Primer

Businesses as people

The myth of trying to change people

Integrate play-time into your everyday

Social drives evolution from within

Give people control, and they make better decisions

Creativity and useless feedback

Spot and stop mistakes

Doubt and advocacy

On the continuum of Rational and Intuitive

Agreement vs alignment

Good intention; not-quite-there execution

The more we can see, the less we choose to see

Control in the hands of the few

The Internet is not self-explanatory

Three design approaches

Rebooting Finland’s education system

Denying reality – the good way

Exporting environmental destruction

Denying reality – the bad way

Serve the process; miss the point

Starting conversations

Understanding your audience

The foundation of authentic communications

Raising a new generation of narcissistic bullies

True rebels

Workplace abuse

The cost of unthinking beliefs, traditions and superstitions

Fears, easy answers, and secret desires

Leveraging the introverted in brainstorming

What future will the price paid buy?

What does humanising business mean?

Don’t forget convenience

Self-regulation is an illusion

Six Secret Multinational Giants

Self belief adjustment

The rich are bad ... mkay ... but we sure want to be rich!

Meetings

“Of the time…”

Gender-based pricing and the illusion of choice

On self esteem and being open-minded

2011

Happy holidays!

Steve Jobs reality distortion

Trust of systems

Recycled stories and the cyclical nature of human ideas

Have we lost the ability to wonder?

People are not fully themselves online

Consumer habits reflect business habits

Social media is a construct

Human factors underpin everything we do

Regardless of the technology, human nature still rules

Reduce options, increase sales

Gamification

A historical lesson in taste

Challenging the myth of the fold (with style)

Basic people skills still apply

Leveraging I and T shaped characteristics through the innovation process

Customer is king...

Low hanging fruit in a high-stress world

Creepy bank promotion

The un-designed Facebook

Liberal vs conservative brains

Don't forget the quiet opportunities

Thoughts on smartphones and tablets

Superstition kills curiosity

The junk-food-ification of media and knowledge

Decision making drivers

Hoarders in the digital world

The impetus to change in times of comfort

The Dark Matter that is consumer-led innovation

Too incompetent to know your own incompetence?

“We’re not having a green revolution, we’re having a green party”

What’s in it for me?

What cultures value

Freeway driving as a business ecology metaphor

Decision making and change

The duality of human nature

Blue on white is unlucky?

A change-embracing approach to business process improvement

Ethics and moral judgements

Consistency of human nature

Make your TV commercials search-inducing

Easy access to diversity

Most businesses can’t and don’t want to be more innovative

Resistance to knowledge, thinking and change

Is culture change a fallacy?

Cheap-Fast-Good – having it all?

Context in communications

2010

Bloom's Taxonomy diagram

What the f**k is my social media strategy?

Porn, (celebrity) gossip, and food

Reflections on travelling: enoughness

Reflections on travelling: The simple pleasure of pure human interaction

Reflections on travelling: Impromptu communities

Reflections on travelling: Compliance-inducing environments

The self-selection of same-same amidst diversity

Reflections on travelling: acknowledging differences while seeking similarities

Taking a sabbatical

The age of crises

Consuming information, oil and alcohol

Personal development underlies good business and good governance

Rethinking innovation – Part 12: The opportunities

Rethinking innovation – Part 11: Cultural change

Rethinking innovation – Part 10: Collaboration and authority

Rethinking innovation – Part 9: Cost-cutting focus

Rethinking innovation – Part 8: Analysis paralysis

Rethinking innovation – Part 7: Long-term thinking and imagination

Rethinking innovation – Part 6: Creativity as a new way of seeing

Rethinking innovation – Part 5: Time pressures

Rethinking innovation – Part 4: Ambiguity

Rethinking innovation – Part 3: Mistakes

Rethinking innovation – Part 2: Fear

Rethinking innovation – Part 1: Reality check

More incentives does not equal more performance

Commission-based remuneration kills creativity

What flavoured chips?

Intelligence in the new interconnected, intrumented world

Board meetings still backward looking

The reassurance of the tangible

I hate dislike Apple but still I talk about them

Empathy vs second-guessing

Social media is boring

The Internet: creativity, connectedness, & generosity

Passion and attraction

The Empathic Civilisation

Cynicism inevitable

The inertia against change

I am satisfied

Empowering creativity

I & T-shaped people in innovation

Good taste and insecurity

Facebook – strike one!

A matter of degree

Disaster relief or cause?

The fiddle-worthy nature of products

Do you worry about odour?

Free book idea

It is ok to lie and misinform

An opportunity for Singapore to show visionary leadership

The people who give selling a bad name

Malmö solar panels

Government sues itself

Environmental impact on how we think about the world

Why Group Norms Kill Creativity

Ideas: to share or not to share?

Tokyo railway poster

Invisible excellence – Tokyo pavement

Invisible design – Tokyo manholes

The heal-thyself myth

The big picture in service design

Two approaches to buying

Valuing the service component of products

Service design and the attention economy

Picasa 3 face detection rudeness

Cycles

The gravy train trap

Japan day 10

Japan day 9

Japan day 5

Japan day 6

Japan day 7

Japan day 8

Japan day 2 – vending machines a sign of civilisation

Japan day 1 – the small town metropolis

Empathy and regulations

Small thoughts kill ideas and collaborations

Two ways to ask why

2009

The Story of Stuff

The little things – Twitter

The little things – VISA PayWave

Double-edged sword

Yelling, praise and learning

Deliberate or unwise image choice?

Sensitivity to subtleties

Craig

Death by Information Overload

No soliciting telemarketers

Something for everyone

The corporatisation of life

Fun is the easiest way to change behaviour

The big-small supplier cycle

“But that was my idea”

Disposable / sacrificial business models

Hungry Planet

Effort of love

Greed is a game

Collectivist and Individualist societies

Wealth is a barrier to innovation

Noise, big breasts, and the hedonic treadmill

Measuring what is easy, not what matters

Trust and happiness

Look-down vs look-up consumers

The value of inappropriate ideas

Breakable glass

Playfulness

“Them” and “us”

Integrative thinking

Reactive vs proactive thinking

Kia-su economics

World in transition

Tax office thank you

Design process – how not to do it

Crisis-driven change

Social media and the porn industry

At Poznan, no one is listening

Two insightful and fun gems

Hyper-stimulated patrons at … the ad:tech keynote!

Business is personal (in Arab culture)

Transmitter and receiver orientations in communications

Nature versus nurture

Relationships more important than tech specs

Alignment is a universal challenge

What girls and boys value

Singapore cinema patrons showing symptoms of a hyper-stimulated society?

10 Worst Countries to be a Blogger

The folly of the advertising account pitch process

The kindness of strangers

Status Anxiety

No to pessimism paranoia and selfishness

The shape of things to come?

Global rapid interconnectedness

Soapie for a hyper-stimulated society

Is Asian culture curbing creativity?

Top Chinese and Singaporean concerns

Silence is golden is innovation

Fire hydrants – hidden critical infrastructure

Funny evidence of short term thinking

Idiot in charge

The problem of alignment

Questionable products and services

Lost Generation

The rise of the small

Naughty twitterings

Web censorship reveals dodgy leadership traits

Repair not replace

Google insight on humanity

Best customer service experience

Core of conflict

Noisy clients and natural selection

Using cheating as an honest means

TV and Internet use are complementary

Giving first makes getting later easier

Outliers

Social graces, ethics and learnt behaviour

Crappy travel agent

Is your business a fundi or freethinker?

We are the tools we use

Cultural barriers to innovation

Blue on white is unlucky?

2008

How much?!!!

Buyology - sex does not actually sell!

Love keeps businesses excelling

Valuing ideas vs “real work”

A Poverty of Desire

Irrationality, morality, respect, mirroring, social empathy, self reflection, conciliation

Which one is the real brand?

Summaries are products

“It’ll do.”

A Manifesto for NonProfit CEOs

Dilbert mashups

Six Illusions

All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten

Habituation hides quality failures

The cost of video piracy to quality

Cat earned Japanese city millions

Three stereotypes

Two different attitudes

Why does everything have to beep?

A sure sign of an e-society?

E.piphanies

Congruence and life on the Internet

Rethinking government

Of wikis and emails

Consumer trends in three different worlds

Two restaurant sites

Silly post leads to potential idea

From knowledge worker to conceptual worker

Thoughts on expectations management

Sticky

Core drivers

Four turbulent characteristics

Do the test

Emotions and decision-making

Mobile phones and planes

Funny name: cross-cultural fail

The unspoken rules

That backlit logo on MacBooks

Perceived responsibility creep

Website barriers to effective communications

Five gamification techniques for business

Certainty is irrational

We will be heard

Paul Bennett: Design is in the details

On sidewalks and thinking

"New Look"

When service becomes automated and meaningless

Design is unnecessary and materialistic

Humidifiers in Singapore

On travelling and blogging

Off to Singapore and China

Workaround

And that's what we call "market sentiment"

Cash registers broken = free gorcery

Slags on business without facts

Rationality is an illusion

Businesses that have persistent IT emergencies

Mac vs PC - choice is irrational

Seven Deadly Sins 2.0

MacBook Air selling in spite of missing bits – the soft stuff matters most

Bigger is not always better

How do you treat your staff?

Solutions are all around us

Fostering involvement and buy-in – what the cat taught me

Identifying email hoaxes

Attracting vs coercing customers

When "sellers" think they are more important

It is about people; not the technology

The world's most...

Valuing the virtual vs the physical

Cattywumpus

2007

The Golden Compass - we are the choices we make

Humans will be humans

Bell curve of prevailing emotions

Customer participation

Global economy by language

Denial

[America has] two values…

Idempotent

Real life or not real life?

BPM* hypocrisy

The case for being a jerk?

Titi and Silly

What price self-esteem

The end of ecards?

Psychological salary

Those who are best suited to power

Lost in the rush

Sending strangers to your home

Working with the nature of people

Don’t made me think!

Terrorism - principles are more effective than rules

Being, flow, and not pushing

Anthropomorphisation

Knowledge workers in the factories

To laugh often and much

Stumbled upon in the toy department

The stimuli behaviour cycle

True joy of life

The Cluetrain Manifesto

2006

Be a kid again

Never argue with an idiot

Changing ‘them’ is easier

Profit centres and esteem

Over-planning over a toothbrush

Commercial strategy for tomorrow

The Nice Factor Book

Never work when you are desperate

Evangelical fear

Unexpected consequences

One word to open new worlds

Dream house, dream business

Choosing input

Contemplating an egg

Dominant vs submissive states

How do you shop?

It’s all perception

Bellyaching yum cha waiting

What has your business done for you lately?

The blessings of peripheral pains

Brightness knob

Flash bulbs in stadiums

Tipping the barber

Where money comes from

Chocolate meetings

New beginnings

Corporations as psychopaths

Working with your “faults”

Butterflies or blowflies?

How much do we give a damn?

Play is…

Wasting the magic

2005

Hardwired to not see the forest?

Enterprise Systems Integration means…

Leadership ten commandments

“The first pancake is always lumpy.”

Train of thoughts (attention CityRail)

What will be in demand

The 10-second trust test

Optimism - alive and well!

A slapping for AFR BOSS

Middle management disconnect

Instant judgements