52 Foibles: Collection Bias

In the whirl of our day-to-day interactions, it’s all too easy to forget the nuances that distinguish great teams, great cultures, and great products/services.

52-Foibles brings together 52 insights from psychology into an easy reference and brainstorming tool. Each card describes one insight into human behavior and suggests ways to apply this to your teams as well as the design of your products and services.

 

CARD #14	Collection Bias When there is interest, people like to amass units that add to or complete a set.
	How might this apply to great teams and cultures? Organizations collect “award-winning”, world class talent from best schools. Amazon looks for “exemplary practitioners and pragmatic visionaries.” Where companies collect talent, employees collect career experiences, awards, and certifications to help them advance toward a career goal. How might this apply to great products? Coupons, badges, words, pieces of a larger whole—the options are limitless. It’s best if these items link to one’s reputation and reinforce the content of your product or service. Business applications may benefit from performance-based collectibles that correlate with speed, frequency, quantity, effectiveness and other desirable metrics.
	Consider Is there an opportunity to collect something in your organization? How do you enhance your reputation?
	See Also Chunking, Set Completion, Achievements, Autotomy, Variable Rewards, Scarcity, Self-Expression