****Please forgive any and all transcription errors as this was transcribed by Otter.ai.****

Melina Palmer 0:00

Hi, I'm Melina Palmer and you're listening to a sharks perspective.

(Music - shark theme)

Kenneth Kinney 0:20

Welcome back and thank you for joining A Shark's Perspective. I am Kenneth Kinney but friends call me Shark. I'm a keynote speaker, a strategist, a shark diver, host of this show, and your Chief Shark Officer.

Kenneth Kinney 0:32

Did you know that we make around 35,000 decisions every day? It's often that when I speak about behavioral science on stage and on the show, it's most often about consumers and how to apply that science. But most of us spend more time in our jobs than shopping....at least I hope you do that. What about the application of behavioral science in the workplace? After all, companies are also trying to inspire employees to be naturally better at dealing with change, which is constant, but our communications and managerial style may not always reflect that to foster better performance. Sometimes just micro shifts and behavior can make you more thoughtful. The question is then, what do your employees need and can't tell you?

Kenneth Kinney 1:13

Melina Palmer is an applied behavioral economist, the CEO of The Brainy Business, a podcast host, instructor at the Human Behavior Laboratory at Texas A&M University, and the author of “What Your Employees Want and Can’t Tell You: Adapting to Change with the Science of Behavioral Economics.”

Kenneth Kinney 1:30

And on this episode, we'll discuss behavioral science at work 35,000 decisions a day, what employees want and can't tell you, what consumers want and can't tell you, nudging an elephant, getting a meeting with Oprah, priming, burning popcorn moments at work, and what not to say via email false, consensus effect, groupthink, nudging, sludge, monkeys and cucumbers and how employees want fairness, sharks in the Puget Sound, interviewing an octopus, behavioral baking theory, gluten free everything, and a lot, lot more.

Kenneth Kinney 1:59

So let's tune into a behavioral economist with a shark who is almost always on good behavior. Well, this episode of A Shark’s Perspective.

[music]

Kenneth Kinney 2:12

Melina Welcome to A Shark’s Perspective. Tell us if you will a little bit about you, and your brainy business story?

Melina Palmer 2:18

Sure, so I am an applied behavioral economist, which essentially means I help people and those in business to understand the psychology of how people act, choose Change and buy. And in that way it is we like to think what people will do often we think about what people should do and build out products and programs and everything in that way. That that's not what people actually do. So I help people to understand what they and others will actually do, and then communicate better.

Kenneth Kinney 2:51

And then you've got a new book, that was your first book that really perfectly describes your first book as well. Talk a little bit about your new book, what your employees need, and can't tell you, which just came out recently. So congratulations. But what's the difference there?

Melina Palmer 3:03

Thank you. Yeah, so the first book is what your customer wants, and can't tell you. And like you said, the second what your employees need and can't tell you, it's definitely still applying behavioral economics into conversations and communication at work. And it's really focused on how the brain reacts and thinks about change. And so when we're planning for changes at work, we often think only the really big stuff matters. You know, you've got a CEO retiring, you got a merger, you've got a huge rebrand. And that's something that deserves a project. So that's all that should matter for change for people. But our brains really work in micro moments in tiny, tiny decisions. And so even the smallest change can have a real disruption in our other behaviors. And so understanding change differently, helps people to be better at managing themselves and you know, leading others in teams and having influence at work.

Kenneth Kinney 3:58

So before we dive directly into the book, I think this is important conversation for you. Because it's so much of what we do is subconscious buying off of motion. And you talked about this as well in your keynotes and speeches, in your research as well. But how much of this do you think is differentiated inside a workplace, versus what we typically think about with decision making process? When we go buy something?

Melina Palmer 4:22

It's, I mean, so all the concepts still apply, and then might just be shifted in some way or another. And I have students will ask, you know, let's say or, you know, listeners of the podcast or whatever will reach out and say, Yeah, but I'm in b2b sales, and I'm doing you know, these big things. So that's different, right? It's, it's really not. So we're, you're still as long as you're a human dealing with humans. It comes into play. And so in the case of work and change, we like to think that we will be more thoughtful are logical about things and not be, you know, running on autopilot like we might be when we're buying things in a supermarket. And that's just not how it is. And actually, we get a lot more territorial about work stuff. And it's such a big part of our identities, that the subconscious can really just hone in on the things we have in the status quo and not wanting to change. And we get really bogged down with deadlines and stress, that makes us even more likely to look to the status quo. So I would say these things come into play even more often at work. And so it's really important to navigate it better. And because our bosses and the people that are communicating to us are also bogged down with deadlines, and stressed they're sending really short communications and missing steps, and it just really compounds on itself and makes everything worse.

Kenneth Kinney 5:54

Well, I think it's fascinating, because if you talk about behavioral science, a lot of times, people automatically go towards thinking about what they see at the end cap, or you know, the cereal boxes. And that's their, their metaphor for how they think about how we sort of apply those decision processes, but it applies just as much in the work as well. But you address a lot of this is habits. How do we go about identifying the habits we have inside of our four walls of our company and what we're doing there as behaviors?

Melina Palmer 6:22

Yeah, so a habit is that we have a context, that and some sort of cue that we know that we have this learned behavior. So when it's repeated, and we know that there's a reward on the other side, our brain has some level of predictability and gets excited about that thing. So the contextual cue, we know from experience, we get whatever the little treat is, and we want that thing. So I like to give the example of I love a chai tea latte. I'm a Starbucks girl. And you know, if I drive past the Starbucks on my way to work. And I think that I'm gonna have willpower and not stop today, because there's too much sugar and everything in that. And it's not good for me, when I'm trying to use willpower, then in the moment, my brain is like, oh, but today, we've got the time and it's going to be really stressful that you know, I'm already in the line. Willpower is really difficult in that way. But if I take a different route to work, and don't drive by the Starbucks, I don't see the logo, I don't have that contextual cue, I don't have that same urge to go get the chai and feel like I need it. So understanding the thing that is triggering us is important and understanding the habit. And our days, our brains, our lives, everything we do is really built on habits, the average person makes 35,000 decisions every single day. That so lot. And it's not just breathe in breathe out stuff, it's it's real decisions that we're making throughout the day. And so we only have a very limited amount of capacity for conscious processing of those decisions. A lot of it, again, is done habitually. So if you're trying to change too many things at once, for someone, again, those little things that you don't think should matter, you're having them go to a different desk, they're going to use a different system, you want them to put their name differently at the top of the form, or they have to be clicking on this extra box that they don't usually do. And then you ask them to be on board with this really big, other change, and they react negatively and have this weird outburst that doesn't make any sense. It's potentially because you're appending too many habits at once. So, you know, in the book, I talk about the importance of being more thoughtful about what you're going to be doing and when, and removing some of those little things that maybe aren't as important, and not putting them and stacking them on top of a really important change. And making sure that you're phasing things in so people have the time to turn something into a new habit. And just don't be continually changing stuff that doesn't need to be changed.

Kenneth Kinney 9:02

Yeah, you're talking about it? Well, when you framed how to reduce that cognitive load, which is a perfect part of it. So tough question here. If you wanted to talk to Oprah Winfrey, how would you leverage behavioral science to do that? And explain the difference here between the receptionist and the executive?

Melina Palmer 9:20

Yeah. So when we think about our brains, and I've talked a little bit about the conscious and the subconscious, that subconscious is the filter really at the front that is helping to determine what information you can make it to that conscious brain. So I talked about that as the subconscious being like that receptionist if you're trying to get a meeting with Oprah you don't get to just call Oprah. You have to go through a series of receptionists and people to be able to get there. Another really great analogy that resonates well with people and I talk about a lot especially in the second book is one from a psychologist from NYU and he He talks about thinking about the brain like a person riding an elephant. And so the logical conscious writer has a plan, you know where you want to go, you know, the best way to get there and you are ready to go. Unfortunately, you are at the mercy of the elephant. And if it wants to sit down or run in a different direction, you can't push or pull or logic it into going where you want it to go. You need to understand what motivates that elephant and help nudge it along the path to get to the right place. So when we're communicating with other people, and we're building out our communication plan, or whatever, we like to think that it's our writer talking to their writer, but really, we need to become an elephant Whisperer in this way, right? You need to grease the wheels with the receptionist to be able to have a meeting with Oprah.

Kenneth Kinney 10:48

By the way, would you bring this up earlier? You drink Chai lattes? Yes. And you go to Starbucks and you live in Washington? It almost seems like it's very cliche for people that don't live in Washington, but you still have a fair amount of good local coffee shops. Of course, yes. Yeah. Which a lot of states do not have. And there's not nearly that many of local coffee shops he used to be. Yeah, I really miss.

Melina Palmer 11:12

Yeah, Seattle is definitely a coffee town. I am not a huge coffee drinker for being a Seattle person. And because I go for Chai, and that's the chai, like a chai tea latte is definitely not the same everywhere. And I know for real coffee drinkers, coffee is not coffee. Right? And so having because I do travel a lot. The standard that the chai is the chai regardless of where I am. That's

Kenneth Kinney 11:38

agree. Yeah, no, I lived. I lived in Brazil, in France. And you know, when I go to Starbucks, it's not the same. Yeah. So one of the things that you addressed in the book as well, and I love talking about this, especially in the world of data science, but it's bias. So how do we go about trying to remove this as a manager? You know, and how does it work with employees, because it's so easy to inject bias without knowing.

Melina Palmer 12:04

So the thing to do is not to think about removing it. So part, the book is separated into three parts. The first one is how the brain works. Part two is looking at some specific scenarios at work and that segmented in a way of working at incorporating bias and heuristics, understanding that and behavioral science. And then my framework for change is part three, the first chapter of part two is called I'm not biased. And just like getting out of the way, right at the beginning to say, there are lots of organizations and people think we're going to be completely unbiased, we're going to remove bias from our organization. And that's not possible in our brains run on bias. That is how we make those 35,000 decisions every day. So that is an unachievable goal. Instead, what we want to be able to do, what's more effective is to understand bias, and to know the rules that that subconscious elephant is using to make decisions throughout the day. And then understand which ones we can be leveraging, to help us get to a particular outcome. So working with the bias that exists because we have to be using that to make all those decisions, make it easier. So there may be some that we're trying to avoid when we can free up some of that cognitive load some of that space to make it so we can have that more conscious thought when it really matters. And make everything else easier by leveraging those biases.

Kenneth Kinney 13:37

So later on, you talk a little bit about priming, which again, I often talk about in relation to the marketing work that I did. But give us an example good or bad that really sort of best illustrates how priming plays a part of this with employees and managers.

Melina Palmer 13:51

Yeah. So with this I talk about so my framework for change management is the same one I use for pricing strategy. It's called it's not about the cookie. In the case of pricing strategy. You know, it's talking about the center of the cookies, what you're drawing people in. When I talk about this for change, I use a different scent here being popcorn. So you know, the movies, popcorn draws us in and we get soda and have this great experience. Everyone's been in the office when someone burnt a bag of popcorn. It's terrible. And it's all anyone can talk about for half a day, right? The whole productive day is completely wasted. Because everyone's gossiping about this and saying, Oh, I bet that was Molina, she reheated salmon and broccoli last week, right? It's like no one's getting anything done. So when you think about your communication and what you're sending out before the change, so everything that comes before the change matters more than the change itself, how you talk about how it's presented, the context it comes up in. And so one of those things is this priming the I give an example of a real burnt popcorn moment of an old boss that It sent me an email, I got about 10am On a Thursday. And it said, We need to talk be in my office at two, which is terrifying email to get. And you can be darn sure I spent the next four hours looking at every single project I was working on. And every conversation I had been having, and coming in just ready for defending myself to the ends of the earth, right.

Kenneth Kinney 15:25

I would have packed everything in my bag, cleaned up my desk, right? You know, expletives, I'm out.

Melina Palmer 15:32

Well, and this was within the first 90 days, I had a great working missionary this person for over very long, like, why don't, so I get gesture to sit down at 159. I'm braced for impact. And the message is, wanted to let you know, I'm going to be out of the office tomorrow. And I'm putting you as the contact in my email response. And that was it that that was the big message that was coming up. I don't remember anything else that we talked about, and the rest of that meeting. And I lost hours of productive time from something that saved her five minutes, if that right.

Kenneth Kinney 16:12

It was probably her fault. She's probably the one that birthed the popcorn too.

Melina Palmer 16:15

right. And so that was a very burnt popcorn moment. So in this case, it was nothing that mattered. And I learned over time, this was this person's style, and they're busy and whatnot. But knowing that change isn't about you, it's, I have two chapters in the book, The first one is called Change is all about you. And it has nothing to do with you. So the way you present information is something you can absolutely control like this, finding your moments of burnt popcorn, and adjusting them. So you can be presenting information to people that makes it easier for them to be ready for change. Because Can you imagine if I went into that meeting, and then she did want to tell me about some big change that I needed to get on board with. That burnt popcorn made it. So there's no way I'm receptive to that in this moment. And it's not that the change is bad has nothing to do with that. It's about the context and what came before that matter. So you know, if this is the only invitation or email that you send, the meeting has the exclamation point on it, and that it's mandatory, or I know someone who had was working at an organization that got everybody got emails with an NDA, that they had to sign a week before a meeting that they were going to be attending. Like, you get the NDA a week in advance, and we're going to talk about something and you have to sign this to come to the meeting, but we're not going to tell you what we're talking about. Like, whoa, there's a lot of other talk happening there. So understanding that popcorn and whether it's you know how you can remove those burnt popcorn moments. That's how I talked about priming in the case of change.

Kenneth Kinney 17:50

Yeah, so this was something I struggled with, when I read it, it just reminded me because I wrote a lot of things without emotion and could have written that email and wouldn't have thought twice about it. It's amazing how people can look at things completely differently. Sometimes you don't need, you're just busy, you're caught up in other pressures that they run through, and then it becomes something you can take a little behavioral change, just change somebody's multiple people's days. So

Melina Palmer 18:15

yeah, I have. So within the book, it's uh, you know, it's looking at this longer scope of change of thoughtfulness and how it can have this really great ripple effect across organizations and people's time and, and whatnot. But I also include in there multiple, what I call MicroShift moments. So these opportunities for a little win along the way, just a little something that you can go change immediately and start to see the benefit of so that you can have some like little moments of value that as you keep going through

Kenneth Kinney 18:49

explain what the false consensus effect is, and how that applies to managing employees.

Melina Palmer 18:55

Well, that's just all over the place, right? That's the the name, that's where the name pretty closely says, you know, what we've got going on there that we assume that everyone agrees with whatever it is that we are talking about. Our brains are really wired to think that we're better, faster, stronger, smarter, and less biased than everybody else. And so we've all been in the meeting, you know, or someone will say, anybody got questions? No, good, let's keep going. You didn't even give an opportunity. And this is the framing opportunity there. You know, where you can insist, saying no one has questions, right? is very different than saying, hey, what am I missing here? You're gonna end up in a different spot. So that false consensus effect assumes that you're right, everyone else sees it the same way. And this is the good way to go and you want to just move along. But in business, it's really important to look for those opportunities where someone can point out the stuff we're missing because we're missing a lot of things. Yeah.

Kenneth Kinney 19:57

Well, I'm fascinated by groupthink, which you talked about it is not far behind and elaborate, if you will a little bit on that.

Melina Palmer 20:04

Sure, yeah, I mean, along the same way false consensus effect works with groupthink, we're hurting species, we don't want to be standing out, especially if you have, you know, a manager that makes it pretty clear that they don't want to be slowed down by you asking questions. Or, you know, we've we thought about this, we know it's ready to go and like, Don't poke holes in it. And that's a point where in meetings, you get people that assume to win. So we also have this combines with like a bystander effect. So if you have a heart attack, and you're in a large crowd, you are less likely to receive any help, or have anyone call 911. Then if you were, there's just one other person around. And we assume that if a lot of people see something, if a lot of people are there, someone else is taking care of it. And then in the group think piece is we just start to conform to those around us. If no one else is saying anything, I guess we shouldn't either. It's a safety thing. It's like said hurting thing. And you don't want to look dumb in front of the group. And so if you have built this culture of people not bringing up problems when they exist, you have people that just assume, you know, it's not worth saying anything, because nothing ever happens anyway. Or they have to have seen this problem. It's such an obvious issue. Someone's already talked about that. So I don't need to or it's not worth my time. I don't need to stand out. Friend of mine talks about this as not being the tall poppy. Yeah, because that's a good way to get your head cut off, right?

Kenneth Kinney 21:47

Well, one of the worst parts is that in this group, think narrative where no one's going to help you, the great majority of people have their phones out taking video out with, right you know, anybody helping anybody with CPR, or whatever, which is a whole sadder story. But you know, most of the managers out there can have an impact on culture, a lot of it has to be driven and supported from the top. But if you're at a manager, and you're trying to eliminate or overcome some of this groupthink and false consensus, narratives, spark innovation, while you're still trying to get done, what you're trying to get done, sometimes they don't want anybody to your you've mentioned this earlier, they don't want anybody to poke holes in it, because they want it completed and done. How would you help a manager change that to where they can not let everybody be sheep?

Melina Palmer 22:34

Yeah, well, it's definitely taking that step back to being more thoughtful about the work that we are doing. And knowing that. So research shows that so going to this burnt popcorn thing back again, a little bit the when we think about sending an email, I always talked about cookies and popcorn. Yeah. When we, you typically wouldn't send an email, I would hope, you know, most of the time we send emails, assuming that we've said enough, and the other person is going to get what we're talking about. We don't send out communication, thinking it's going to be misunderstood. But what research has found is that people misunderstand our emails, half the time, half the time people don't know what we're talking about. And as a result of this, and many other things, you end up with over I think it's 68% of the work that people are doing is unimportant, busy kind of work. So if I send a confusing email, just to get it out the door because I'm busy. And then someone is having to spend time thinking about what I meant, and go do some research. And then send me an email back to say, Did you mean this and say, No, I'm at this, and then you send a Slack communication and stop by just for five minutes, just quick, five minutes, that becomes 20 minutes, because we start talking about something else, we get stretched so thin, so quickly, that it just compounds and we can't work on the really important stuff and be more creative for everyone who said that you work better under a deadline. And yes, I have done this myself, I have believed this in the past. We're all wrong. We don't work better under a deadline, we're more efficient. But we're not more creative. We're not doing better work. We're just finally checking the thing off the box, because we have to. And so being able to look at time differently, being able to have more time to be more thoughtful, being able to sit in problems in a different way and have better conversations is going to be so much more effective for business. And to do this as the manager. What you can do is take a moment and say, Why am I sending this? Where are the problems that might come up here in that we need to talk be in my office at two. If it was to say, Hey, I'm in be out tomorrow, are you available at two o'clock to go over some things? Completely different experience, and it took 30 seconds of thought, you know, to be able, and then I didn't lose four hours of productivity and all these things that happen along that way. So those little adjustments can make a big difference in you know, we haven't talked specifically. Whoa, specifically about nudges are working here. Okay. Well, I talk about, of course, nudges in the book, but also talk about sludge, and sludge being something that in general, we want to eliminate in the world around us. There's too much stuff gunking up the works, and making things ineffective and inefficient with extra forms and clicks and conversations and tedium, right. That being said, I'm an advocate for useful thoughtful sludge being put into your own way, especially when we're looking at communication, and we're busy to make it so you're going to be more effective. So instead say maybe instead of sending out an email, immediately, that you have created some form of sludge for yourself, that everything has to go into an outbox, that you need to take at least 30 minutes before you go in and review before you send those emails out and make sure everything is in there. And I can appreciate that you're hearing this and saying, Well, I don't have time for that. But again, remember, if those emails are all, you know, 50% More likely, you know that people are going to understand them. And we remove a lot of that 68% Just say 25%. Imagine that 25% of your email, Slack communication, random stop bys for clarification, and confusion on your team. A quarter of that is gone. From your day and everyone on your team? How much more effective? Could you be? So little thoughtfulness, a little sludge can actually be helpful.

Kenneth Kinney 27:07

Yeah. And I think thoughtful sludge is the great title for your next book. I love it. But no, I mean, iOS 16 came out in the they allow you now to pull back emails and make some edits. And that was something that a lot of programs have done outlook has done for years where you can delay it. But I think if you could delay every tweet, every specially Twitter, every social media post every thing you do and just take half a second to think about it before. That doesn't mean that you're necessarily going to be nice, you can double down on angry if it's caused. But if you just think about more of it than just subconsciously, some of your subconscious behaviors are much worse than you know. So.

Melina Palmer 27:49

And in written communication, they come across way more harsh than we think they are going to

Kenneth Kinney 27:56

100%. So let's talk a little bit about capuchin monkeys who like cucumbers and fairness, because I thought this was great another part of this but how how employees or monkeys want fairness.

Melina Palmer 28:08

Right. So this is such a fun example. And I highly recommend there's a TED talk of I think it's ended up paper, it's called monkeys reject on equal pay, I think is what it's called. And so in this case, there is a monkey a Capuchin that is being paid in cucumber for a task a very simple task, and in general, monkeys like cucumbers. And so this is a reasonable payment of you know, you hand me a rock you get to eat a cucumber yay for you, right simple thing. In this case, there's the monkey Lance gets its cucumber, she's really excited about it and find we don't happy. And then the next Capuchin named winter is given a grape for her task. And so Lance is really excited because just like humans, like know that grapes are better than cucumbers in general, capuchins feel the same way. Lance is really excited and doing the second round of handing over the rock. But when she's given a cucumber again, takes a small bite, and throws it back at the researcher, because this is unacceptable because she was expecting her grape. And then winter goes again and gets another grape. Lance does the task again and is still given cucumber doesn't even try to eat it and just throws it back. It was and shakes the cage and anger. I mean, it's a whole deal. And we think it's funny, but we do this all the time in life. And you know, there's lots with game theory and how we have really long memories. And it's important to know that fairness is a relative concept. You know, it was perfectly fine to get paid and cucumbers until you realize that your coworkers are being paid in grapes. And there's another example here, where there's a different Capuchin that wanted everybody was getting peanuts for something that he wasn't a part of the task and is trying to give more and more food. And at one point tries to give a quarter of an orange for in exchange for a peanut, which is totally out of alignment, where an orange is very much a better food source. But because everyone else has peanuts, that's what I want right now. So understanding fairness and how things are perceived, having as much transparency so that we don't even have to worry about fairness can make it so people can be more productive when it when there's questions of what's equitable, who's getting what, what's fair, it definitely makes it that again, we're not being productive and getting real work done.

Kenneth Kinney 30:43

I thought it was fascinating. And I'm just glad they didn't use cucumber water. Because that's what they've trained us to think is actually good when it's not. Let's go back in then and talk about how do we create that change through knowledgeable moments?

Melina Palmer 30:58

Yeah, so in going back to our micro moments and decisions there, my advice always is to be more thoughtful about the long term goal, we want to know where we're trying to get to, and then break that into its smallest components, and not try to do too much too quickly. So we have a tendency to, you know, get into the meeting, and I have someone here in front of me now. So I'm going to give them the laundry list of stuff before I get to the big problem, right? When really, if we think about, if this meeting only accomplishes one thing, what's the most important thing on the other side of this meeting, and it might just be for them to be open to the idea that a change is coming. And so giving them a laundry list of other stuff is going to make it so they're less likely to be open to that thing. So thinking about those small moments, those small changes the micro pieces, we can then look for the moments where we can be nudging in the direction that this needs to go for the longer bigger picture. So this meeting, instead of having a one hour meeting all the time, lots of one hour meetings, we could break down and say, you know, this is 15 minutes, we're going to talk about this, we're gonna go through this process, you're open to this idea, and we're gonna meet again tomorrow for the next piece you don't you're able to it's definitely a tortoise in the hare approach for business.

Kenneth Kinney 32:25

Well, one of the things I really appreciated throughout the book, and I didn't ask a specific question about it, but you touch on a topic that I focused a lot of time and thought on as well as trust he wove that in, and how important that is, even as part of his behavior to help build trust. But overall, considering solid 300 pages worth of material, is there any one big tip that you want people to think of when they get out of here they go grab a copy of the book, and they read it and they jump out and they remember one big thing to go put to work tomorrow.

Melina Palmer 32:55

Well, you know, being thoughtful is something that's always important to me, I end every episode of my podcast, and it's my email signature to be thoughtful in all these ways. So taking a little bit more time to think about yourself and your actions and those of others. And also to not feel like you have to do everything. When we think we need to apply everything we learned in that 300 page book. We ended up doing nothing. And so if you choose one thing that matters right now, and you can do that small thing today that's going to help you get to whatever that goal is. doing one thing is better than doing than having a plan to do 100 things.

Kenneth Kinney 33:34

Sure. Well, you're you're the Puget Sound. Have you ever seen a shark in the Puget Sound?

Melina Palmer 33:38

I have not. And I feel like I need to say that I'm, I'm thankful to have not but then I would say no, you're gonna tell me no, I should know

Kenneth Kinney 33:45

Well, no, there's there's a lot of oh, there's several coldwater sharks that are non threatening that don't ever come in contact with people listed fishing boats. But I was sad because most people that live there don't see him very often. That means six Gill sharks don't pop up very frequently in those kind of waters. But is this of all my guess? What is your favorite kind of shark and why? I don't behavioral economic standpoint.

Melina Palmer 34:13

I don't have enough knowledge of sharks to have a favorite kind of shark. And so I would say I have a favorite. My favorite animal is an octopus. So that would be which is a less common favorite animal I think than what we see around and they're very brainy, thoughtful, creative, curious creatures. So that's,

Kenneth Kinney 34:39

I actually interviewed an octopus. I say I took a GoPro in a old microphone underwater when I was in La Jolla Cove earlier in the year and we got video of me acting like I'm interviewing this octopus a lot safer to do that than when the shark and the octopus didn't have a lot to say. But Molina It is a special time the show are you ready for the five most interesting and important questions that you're going to be asked today. Yes. All right, number one, he talked about smells earlier. So let's say that this is warm food in it. And you can smell it when you walk in walking into a DoubleTree hotel, or walking into a movie theater? So this is chocolate chip smells, or buttered popcorn smells.

Melina Palmer 35:24

I have celiac disease. So as a world where and I know I talk about baked goods all the time, but because I can't have gluten popcorn would be the safer bet for me. Hey, you, you had the baking theory or? Yeah, behavioral baking is

Kenneth Kinney 35:41

Yeah, I don't even remember the celiac part. So Alright, number two needs or wants?

Melina Palmer 35:50

Wants as far as like communication within Well, I think wants is a better approach. For more interesting opportunities.

Kenneth Kinney 36:00

Okay, number three, Huskies or Aggies?

Melina Palmer 36:05

Oh, rough one. I'm gonna say I have, I'm gonna have to give them we'll say we'll say gigem. Aggies.

Kenneth Kinney 36:14

Okay. Number four inherited traits or learned traits. I'm doing this in my child's science class right now. So yeah, it worked perfectly for this podcast.

Melina Palmer 36:30

Yeah, I'm gonna go with learned because I find brain Association and word choice to be so interesting. And the concepts that we develop over time and how, you know, something like ghost ghosting, or a ghost being ghosted, right? How that concept has evolved over time is so interesting. And the type of association we have with the word that we wouldn't have had, you know, five years ago, or 10. I think that's interesting.

Kenneth Kinney 37:00

So perfect question for a behavior common behavioral economist, not a communist behavioral economist. The most important question that you're going to be asked today is biscuits or cornbread? And let's say gluten free.

Melina Palmer 37:15

i Yes. Yeah. No biscuits.

Kenneth Kinney 37:18

Okay.

Melina Palmer 37:19

And I make a lot I make I make a mean gluten free biscuit and gravy.

Kenneth Kinney 37:23

Wow, I got the you. You had me up to last me after you said gluten free.

Melina Palmer 37:29

You can't even....

Kenneth Kinney 37:31

Really?

Melina Palmer 37:31

My the the six year old and nine year olds love them and my gluten free pizza and say it's better than what they get at the store. And so are like out at a restaurant. They like my pizza better. So I'm a very good gluten free Baker.

Kenneth Kinney 37:47

There you go. So believe it where can people find out more about you get a copy of the book, apply this to their own practice, reach out to you by consulting and so much more.

Melina Palmer 37:56

Well, thank you for that. So my website is the best place to go. You can just go to the brainy business.com and learn about the podcast, books, consulting all the things. Also for your audience. If they go to the brainy business.com/shark they can get the first chapter of either of my books. And depending on when you listen to this, I guess any of my books for free just to see, you know if it's really a fit for you, if you want to go ahead and move forward, you get that sample there. So the brainybusiness.com/shark And you can get the first chapter of any of my books for free.

Kenneth Kinney 38:29

Fantastic. Melina, thank you again very much for being with us today on A Shark’s Perspective.

Melina Palmer 38:33

Yeah, thanks for having me.

[music]

Kenneth Kinney 38:40

So there was my conversation with Melina Palmer, and applied behavioral economist, the CEO of The Brainy Business, a podcast host, instructor at the Human Behavior Laboratory at Texas A&M University, and the author of “What Your Employees Want and Can’t Tell You: Adapting to Change with the Science of Behavioral Economics.” Let's take a look at three key takeaways from our conversation with her.

Kenneth Kinney 39:02

First, if you want to change your underlying behaviors, then it starts with your habits loved her pointed that we only have a limited amount of capacity for conscious thoughts. So here's an important habit to build in you. And that is to take a moment to be more thoughtful. And the second habit is never drink a chai tea latte, they are nasty.

Kenneth Kinney 39:21

Second, we talked about priming those burnt popcorn moments in the office. As someone who is an ultra type a monkey or I guess shark in my case, I've been so guilty over the years of writing people with what I thought was a simpler, quick email. She was one that happened to her we need to talk be amorphous it too. I could have written that 100 times over my career and never meant anything bad by it. But you'd be a fool if you didn't see how someone else might view that in a very bad way. We get bad like this one slack and other channels. Just think about the reader for two seconds when you write emails. I wish I had thought more about it. Sometimes what you think is clear and concise oftentimes even can have the opposite tone than what you meant or or feel you wrote, The point is not telling what she may feel is someone who's touchy feely, I get that. The point is you need someone to do what you want them to do. There'll be a lot more productive if you do become a little more thoughtful. I continue to learn a lot here myself, and I'll try to also never burn the popcorn. Third, she spoke about how emails are misunderstood half the time. It's amazing that if you focus more on clarity how much more you can help people perform better. Try dose of it with the next one you write. It requires a noun, a verb, and a big touch of clarity. Got a question? Send me an email to Kenneth at a shark's perspective.com.

Kenneth Kinney 40:36

Thank you again for the privilege of your time and I am so thankful to everyone who listens.

Kenneth Kinney 40:40

Be thoughtful, especially today, and join us on the next episode of A Shark’s Perspective.

(Music - shark theme)