Behavior

School bells may be ringing across the country but I am convinced now more than ever that we are not prepared to provide the best education possible for our kids. I was disheartened to learn of the…

Most of my blog posts are dedicated to how behavior shows up in the workplace. But many of you who come to understand and learn about the science of behavior know how effective the science can be in…

Maureen Dowd recently wrote an Op Ed piece in the New York Times entitled Giving Doctors Orders, in which she discusses the importance of speaking up and asking your doctor to wash his or her hands…

This is not the first blog I have written about mistakes I think Google is making in how they are managing the company.  It will probably not be the last.  This blog was prompted by an…

Talk of cutting the Federal budget has been going on for months and will no doubt continue for the foreseeable future.  It is interesting to me that the talk has centered, as it usually does, on…

The San Francisco Board of Governors recently voted to prohibit McDonald's from selling Happy Meals with a toy unless the contents of the Happy Meal meet certain criteria: it contains less than 600…

As the Thanksgiving travel begins to increase, so too do the TSA screening stories! If you have been watching TV in the last week, you are probably sick of the "should they – shouldn’t they" conduct…

What started with Dan Pink’s “Drive” has now compelled me to discuss Things That Drive me Crazy. In this first installment, I challenge “Behavioral Economists” and their lack of expertise in…

It’s that time of year again, where someone out there, has declared October 16th as National Boss's Day.  Now I’m not saying Bosses shouldn’t be recognized for their efforts (assuming they…

Anyone who understands anything about behavior knows that the latest suggestion by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood for dealing with the problem of texting while driving will not work. He…

Managers learn the budget game quickly or they don't survive.  Ask for more than you need in the hope that you will get just what you need.  Learn why this wastes time and money and what to…

Someone just sent me a YouTube video of Steven Levitt, co-author of Freakonomics, speaking to 1200 business leaders in London in 2007.  The YouTube video is titled, “Why Incentives Don’t Work."…

Guess what? After many months of hard work by many people, we have given birth to a brand new website. The website was done in cooperation with What’s Up Interactive. They were great to work with and…

When I read The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande three things occurred to me.  The first was a joke someone sent me in e-mail last week. “ A man is recovering…

Last week Neil Borofsky, Special Inspector General of the Troubled Relief Asset Program, said   that a number of the bail-out’s key goals “have simply not been met.” The question I have is…

Almost everyone has written or talked ad nauseum about Abdul, etc. so I might as well weigh in.  I am reminded of one of our customers in the carpet hauling business where they would put carpet…

I have quoted the poet, Alexander Pope, a lot lately, but he wrote so many good things.  He wrote, “Hope springs eternal in the human breast; …” As I think back about all the problems in our…

The Fun Theory is a clever marketing campaign from Volkswagen that has caught the attention of behavior analysts because it shows how to change behavior (in this example increase exercise) by…