Imagine a terrible epidemic has broken out in a community and you are the healthcare strategist in charge for taking action. It is believed that 600 lives are at stake and you could choose between one of two vaccines
- The first vaccine will definitely save 200 lives
- The second vaccine is experimental and has a uncertain outcome. It offers a 33% chance that all 600 people will be saved but a 67% chance that no one will be saved. What will you do?
Kahneman found in his studies that most people choose to save the 200 lives [Option 1]
Now imagine instead think about choosing the following two options –
- With the first vaccine 400 of the 600 people will die
- With the second vaccine is experimental and has an uncertain outcome. It provides a 33% chance that no one will die and a 67% chance that everyone will die.
What will you do?
In this version 78% of the respondents said that they will try the experimental vaccine.
This is interesting since the two situations are exactly the same – just expressed differently.
In the first case, the situation was framed as saving 200 lives and the second as letting 400 people die.
People’s risk taking behavior changes significantly depending on how they read ‘save’ and ‘die’
This famous experiments shows how people are deeply influenced by how the problem is framed.
The same situation may seem risk and safe by the same person.
Research says that is is better to view risk from many different perspectives or frames of reference.
If we maintain frames of reference of standard disciplinary fields when working at the intersection then we will always come to the conclusion that the risk is too great.
Even the best inter sectional idea can seem too risky when viewed from the wrong frame of reference.
How do we move past this?
By Shifting the perspective. For example, Richard Bran son values the fun of doing something different.
His strategy is to intersect Virgin businesses with a variety of different business opportunities. He is not sure up front if it will work – but if involves something fun and intrinsically motivating he is taking a very small risk of being bored.
Another perspective – doing something differently is the only chance to make it says the chef, Marcus Samuelson.
If he has stuck within the established field of cooking, he would have been much more difficult to innovation.
” It is virtually impossible not to come out of the intersection – the white space between disciplines – without a vastly expanded set of future opportunities.”
Extract from the book – Medici Effect – What elephants and epidemics can teach us about innovation, Frans Johanssen.
