Design For Thinking! — 2 — Quotidian — 498
(Transcript of video originally posted on 09 Sep 2023)
I was doing a bit of research about this Six-Headed God. And I ended up unearthing something totally unexpected. See, .. We all know this story. Rathi and Manmadan / Kamadeva.. Kamadeva is burnt by Shiva.. For having disturbed his penance, distracting him.. But, did you know, because of this, Rathi, who is the wife of Kamadeva, curses Parvathi!! We call Parvathi the Divine Mother, the Mother of the Universe! Shiva.. Parvathi.. Shivam.. Shakthi.. This Shakthi has a curse now.. She can’t hold children in her womb. She can’t give birth! To the Universal Mother! Did you know!!? Only afterwards, when I cross-checked with what I already knew, things are falling into place.. You see, there are two children. Ganesha and Aarumuga. We saw how Aarumagam was born. Children in a lake. And, that indicates it isn’t Parvathi giving birth. Ganesha? Similar scenario! Parvathi is taking bath, and the soapy dirt that comes off her body is shaped into Ganesha! That’s how that story goes! Again, not a womb-birth. Every day we learn something new! What do you say?!
Namaste! Six Heads. The remaining four now.
The next one is Memory. A sense of “having seen it somewhere”. Much of what we see, is not fresh eyes looking at fresh things. It is tired eyes, bored eyes, looking partially at things, and trying to connect with something we have seen already.
The world’s most loved company! Which one?! Which one?! Tell me! All you will probably remember is, “Four colors”, “Tilted boxes”, “Primary colors”.. But, do you know the right answer? Why? The brain is filling up for all the missed out, little nuanced details.
I am sure you have seen this on Whatsapp. Dentistry is important.. Because? Even though he’s missing an eyebrow, the first thing you notice is his smile! Again, it is the tired brain, lazy eyes, filling up.. We fill all the gaps, using our memory.
Which is why, Jakob’s Law becomes very important. If you are going to design something, and, it is a tried and tested, used product idea, .. you cannot say “I am going to be different from everybody else.. because this is the right way!”.. Even if it is the right way, you need to follow convention. Which is why, the keyboard is even now a QWERTY! We have seen this earlier too!
At Google’s HQ, they provide cycles to go from building to building. I tried riding that cycle once. (Yes, just once!) They didn’t have brakes!! No brakes! Idiotic? Silly? No!! Smart invention! It is low-maintenance. Zero maintenance! Because, there are no levers, wires, and all that. Amazing design! To go forward, you pedal forward like this. And to brake, all you need to do is reverse pedal! Amazing design! But, why aren’t we seeing such cycles all over the city?! People are used to doing THIS for braking! And, that half-a-second delay induced by “thinking” is enough to get you involved in accidents. So, this is a failed model, in my opinion.
The next brain viewpoint is Language. What words, what kind of sentences, what tone of voice you are using, in your communication with your customers. Very very important to attract as well as to retain!
MailChimp is a famous company. And, they have a style guide online, how to write interesting, high quality, respectful content. You will notice topics like “Words to avoid”. Automagically. Funnel. Incentivize. Don’t use such terms. Similarly, avoid racist words. Avoid Silicon Valley cliches.
Look at this simple comparison. You are consulting with a doctor. Does she say Stroke, or Cerebral Vascular Accident? Does she Brain Freeze or Transient Ischemic Attack!? The jargon! Oh! Perhaps she knows her stuff! She is using TERMINOLOGY! Versus.. She is showing off a bit too much! Can’t she see that I am common patient with limited knowledge? Why is she trying to swamp me with three letter acronyms? Do you see that? That perception?
Which is why, perhaps, a beautiful website called Cancer.gov. American Health Department has a website about cancer. About each cancer type, not just one page, but TWO PAGES. Why? This page is for patients, and immediately, every page has a little pointer here which says, “Are you a Health Professional? We have a page for YOU!” Same content, ordered differently, terminology is different, less emotional, more documented, and more scientific perhaps. Both are needed! This is the patient’s version, in comparison. So, when you are talking to somebody, when you are communicating to a customer, or a potential customer, understand their level, understand the level they want to be talked at, and use those two important bits of information, to get your message across.
Then, it is about Decision Making. What are the things you need to take a meaningful decision? The data that you need.. Do you have enough of it? Do you have all the salient bits and pieces you need to take that decision? Also, when you are solving a problem as a product creator, you are solving it after defining the problem in one way. The customer may be having the same problem, but may be defining the problem in a different way. If these two don’t match, your product will never sell to that customer. Because, that customer doesn’t even know that you have a solution for THEIR problem.
Take a look at this example! A student approached us. “I need an AI / AutoML model. I want to train my Raspberry Pi.. And we are trying to fire laser beams at moving targets”… he said. Yes, doable. We can give you a machine learning model. We have code. We have the hardware. But, instead of immediately just addressing the request you heard at the surface level, if you talk to that student, .. “What are you attempting, my friend?” You may perhaps redefine the problem space. What is he doing? He is hunting mosquitoes using laser beams. Is it a game? No! He just wants to have a peaceful night! There is this thing called Odomos.. Have you heard of it?!
Look at what Bill gates is doing. He has invested another million dollars.. ANOTHER. Million dollars. On an astrophysicist who is doing an experiment with laser beams to create a light wall which doesn’t kill mosquitoes but prevents mosquitoes from crossing over into the room. Nice idea. But, the way it looks like, it is going to be so costly, that the places where we need this won’t be able to afford it. Which is why, problem space redefinition, and ensuring your version of the problem and my version of the problem have some sort of alignment and overlap is very important in decision making.
Why not just grow lemongrass, mint, tulsi, .. in your backyard balcony? They are known to be repellents. Mosquitoes won’t even come in! So, why not?!
There is this big goal, always, in Decision Making. Take chess for example. If you are starting a game of chess, you have understood the basic rules, you can’t just parade to the King in the opposite side and demand that he dies. No! There has to be a sub-goal. To capture that King, if I move my Bishop like so.. Yes, I can check him next. Not just that.. To move my Bishop to that position, I will need to move my Pawn, but I can’t move it, and so, probably, I may have to sacrifice. So, a big goal, demands a subgoal, which probably expects a sacrifice. In Decision Making, if you want to really help your customer or your prospect, you may have to clarify not just the goal, but also have to show the way to those subgoals, and help them understand that it is okay making those sacrifices.
The last, the most dangerous, dicey, part of the Six Minds idea, is Emotion. You shouldn’t play with it.. But, it is System One thinking. Most of the time, the decisions you take using your gut feel, the purchases, all those are the emotional moments.
We have seen this earlier too. Are you addressing the Id or are you talking to the Superego? Who are you really trying to pitch your idea to? Don’t focus on the Id!
Loss Aversion, they call it. We are afraid of losses, much much more, than we are happy about gains. The insurance business runs PRIMARILY because of this. The lottery business runs PRIMARILY because of Loss Aversion. People don’t mind taking risks. But, the rewards have to be very much higher than the losses. The perceived reward and the loss. This is an emotional game. If you settle down and calmly evaluate the situation, you will understand that it is silly. You will understand that it is a game. But, in the little time that you have to make those decisions, the emotions make so much noise that your inner mind is unable to help you arrive at the right decision. There are those who misuse it, and there are those who warn you not to misuse it!
We were talking about Loss Aversion. Take this for example. See what a beautiful emotional PLAY is adopted by LinkedIn here! If you want to close your account at LinkedIn, they don’t just say “We are sorry to see you go!”.. They ask, “Are you sure? Do you want to close your account? You’ll lose your connections, messages, endorsements, and recommendations.. Don’t lose touch with your connections..” The faces of the people are shown too!
There are books written about how not to exploit the power of design! It is so important! The name of the book is not “Do Good Design”! Do Good! Do Good! And, do any design that will help you do good! Avoid Dark Patterns.
There is another book — Deceptive Patterns. The website is https://www.deceptive.design ! Look at the lengths they go to, to cheat! To threaten you! To entice you! So, avoid interacting with that emotional mind, except in trying to help it understand that it is in the influence of a Maaya.. An illusion. That is the only thing you are allowed to do!
So, this is the book we have been looking at. And, these are the six minds. Vision / Attention. Wayfinding. Memory. Then we also saw Language. Decision Making. And Emotion.
So, what’s the closing thought? The closing thought takes me a little farther from where the book made me reach. The author listed six beautiful concepts. But, are they commutative? Commutative, in Mathematics, implies, A+B = B+A. AxB = BxA. Is it not? So, whichever mind you place first, whichever you assign most importance to, doesn’t seem to matter. All you need to know is there are six minds, working in tandem. That is the commutative approach to understanding this. But, is that so?
Remember the lenses that we saw earlier? Is the infrared lens up front? Or, is it the zoom lens that is in front? The picture will be different! Probably those six minds are non-commutative. Like this! X-Y is NOT Y-X. X/Y is NOT Y/X. So, when we look at our customers, from among these six minds, which one is paramount for the customer.. That is to be observed! Even if we approach all six simultaneously, you need to understand which one holds sway in the customer’s mind! If we don’t do that, all the effort will just be wasted!
See you soon! Thank you!
