Part one of the Trimtabs Future Salon from 26th of May 2010.

When we shift focus from symptoms of systemic dysfunction to systemic change, an uncommonly rich and inspiring action space becomes available. 'Trimtabs for systemic change' are acts that are small enough to be feasible, which can add up to make our civilization change course and guide us along a new and different direction of progress.

Dino Karabeg has been at the University of Oslo since 1992, where he is a professor in the Institute of Informatics.

More: futuresalon.org/2010/05/future-salon-trimtabs-for-systemic-change.html

P.S. Event was proudly sponsored by SAP

Part one of the Trimtabs Future Salon from 26th of May 2010.

When we shift focus from symptoms of systemic dysfunction to systemic change, an uncommonly rich and inspiring action space becomes available. 'Trimtabs for systemic change' are acts that are small enough to be feasible, which can add up to make our civilization change course and guide us along a new and different direction of progress.

Dino Karabeg has been at the University of Oslo since 1992, where he is a professor in the Institute of Informatics.

More: futuresalon.org/2010/05/future-salon-trimtabs-for-systemic-change.html

P.S. Event was proudly sponsored by SAP

Imagine if programmers were stuck with the Intel 4004 architecture (perhaps the first microprocessor) and had to write better software to work around its many limitations in memory and speed. At the least, they'd bitterly complain. Many would despair of creating modern applications. Yet, in a sense, that's the situation we face with using our cognitive hardware (our brains) to make modern decisions. The physiological hardware of our brains has been essentially unchanged for 35,000 years.

The limits of human cognition are especially apparent with conscious decision making and social or group decisions. This month's speaker, Peter Marks, has conducted significant research in what he calls "Blind Spotting." It turns out that we have more than a hundred documented cognitive and perceptual biases that often hide aspects of reality from conscious examination. The last decade's stunning research on mirror neurons and imitation figures in this as well.

Most of these biases had evolutionary value years ago. And we still can make good largely subconscious decisions, guided by experience and emotion, in many areas. But, our biases often turn out to be a liability in today's world. For example they lead us to believe the world in only 6000 years old, that there were WMD in Iraq, that Bernie Madoff is a financial genius, and a host of other errors of belief and attention in business, science, and politics. In a figurative sense, we're all at least partially blind to our past, present, and especially the future.

The last few years have provided ample evidence we humans just aren't that good at seeing the present or predicting the future. Should BP executives have spent $500,000 to follow safety protocols to avoid the risk of what looks to be a $50,000,000,000 catastrophe? How did Bernie Madoff manage to con hundreds of otherwise smart and capable people for decades? Why are companies -- and the nation -- so often split into warring factions?

Topics we'll cover include a brief nod to the 100+ biases we all share, the ten main underlying (and at least partly innate) factors behind these, and a discussion of concrete steps we can take to make better decisions -- especially when the stakes are high.

Peter Marks

Peter Marks is Managing Director of Design Insight, in Santa Cruz, CA. Marks has published more than 80 articles, 200 benchmark studies, three books, and several films covering various aspects of new product and process development. His book, Aligning Technology for Best Business Results, has been widely praised and translated to German, French, and Japanese. It was the first to discuss business and technology alignment. A second book on Winning Products (understanding the psychology of customer buying decisions) was sponsored by IBM and made part of their internal best practices (the Customer $APPEALS methodology).

Prior to founding Design Insight, Marks’ experience included teaching (visual perception, biomedical instrumentation) industrial research (machining technology), automotive manufacturing (as a Ford Motor Co. manufacturing engineering manager), publishing (an award-winning developer of technical education programs) and a senior executive at two computer-aided engineering companies (one now part of Siemens). He founded Design Insight in 1988.

Imagine if programmers were stuck with the Intel 4004 architecture (perhaps the first microprocessor) and had to write better software to work around its many limitations in memory and speed. At the least, they'd bitterly complain. Many would despair of creating modern applications. Yet, in a sense, that's the situation we face with using our cognitive hardware (our brains) to make modern decisions. The physiological hardware of our brains has been essentially unchanged for 35,000 years.

The limits of human cognition are especially apparent with conscious decision making and social or group decisions. This month's speaker, Peter Marks, has conducted significant research in what he calls "Blind Spotting." It turns out that we have more than a hundred documented cognitive and perceptual biases that often hide aspects of reality from conscious examination. The last decade's stunning research on mirror neurons and imitation figures in this as well.

Most of these biases had evolutionary value years ago. And we still can make good largely subconscious decisions, guided by experience and emotion, in many areas. But, our biases often turn out to be a liability in today's world. For example they lead us to believe the world in only 6000 years old, that there were WMD in Iraq, that Bernie Madoff is a financial genius, and a host of other errors of belief and attention in business, science, and politics. In a figurative sense, we're all at least partially blind to our past, present, and especially the future.

The last few years have provided ample evidence we humans just aren't that good at seeing the present or predicting the future. Should BP executives have spent $500,000 to follow safety protocols to avoid the risk of what looks to be a $50,000,000,000 catastrophe? How did Bernie Madoff manage to con hundreds of otherwise smart and capable people for decades? Why are companies -- and the nation -- so often split into warring factions?

Topics we'll cover include a brief nod to the 100+ biases we all share, the ten main underlying (and at least partly innate) factors behind these, and a discussion of concrete steps we can take to make better decisions -- especially when the stakes are high.

Peter Marks

Peter Marks is Managing Director of Design Insight, in Santa Cruz, CA. Marks has published more than 80 articles, 200 benchmark studies, three books, and several films covering various aspects of new product and process development. His book, Aligning Technology for Best Business Results, has been widely praised and translated to German, French, and Japanese. It was the first to discuss business and technology alignment. A second book on Winning Products (understanding the psychology of customer buying decisions) was sponsored by IBM and made part of their internal best practices (the Customer $APPEALS methodology).

Prior to founding Design Insight, Marks’ experience included teaching (visual perception, biomedical instrumentation) industrial research (machining technology), automotive manufacturing (as a Ford Motor Co. manufacturing engineering manager), publishing (an award-winning developer of technical education programs) and a senior executive at two computer-aided engineering companies (one now part of Siemens). He founded Design Insight in 1988.

Part 2 of MIT Professor Sandy Pentland presenting at the Reality Mining Future Salon: Understanding Information Flow In The Mobile Corporation bit.ly/aoB7JD

Abstract: Mobile phones, laptops, and other digital devices form a network of sensors, recording their user's location, time, who else is nearby, as well communication patterns. We can `reality mine' this data to better understand and predict human behavior within the corporation, and improve coordination, job satisfaction, and productivity. In more than a dozen case studies we have found that this `reality mining' approach to management often uncovers dramatic possibilities for improvement in both job satisfaction and productivity, by allowing more effective combination of face-to-face and digital communications.

Plus interesting questions from the Future Salon audience.