Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life

by Rory Sutherland

A rational leader suggests changing course to avoid a storm. An irrational one can change the weather.

There are many spheres of human action in which reason plays a very small part. Understanding the unconscious obstacle to a new behaviour and then removing it, or else creating a new context for a decision, will generally work much more effectively.

As I always advise young people, ‘Find one or two things your boss is rubbish at and be quite good at them.’ Complementary talent is far more valuable than conformist talent.

It is time to ask another stupid question: What is reason actually for? This may seem absurd, but in evolutionary terms it is far from trivial. After all, as far as we know, every other organism on the planet survives perfectly well without such a capacity. It is true that reason seems to have given us remarkable advantages over other animals – and it is unlikely that we could have produced many of our technological and cultural successes without it. But, in evolutionary terms, these must be a by-product, because evolution does not do long-term planning.*

In the physical sciences, cause and effect map neatly; in behavioural sciences it is far more complex. Cause, context, meaning, emotion, effect.

we don’t so much choose brands as use them to aid choice. And when a choice baffles us, we take the safe default option – which is to do nothing at all.

The only way you can discover what people really want (their ‘revealed preferences’, in economic parlance) is through seeing what they actually pay for under a variety of different conditions, in a variety of contexts.

‘People do not choose Brand A over Brand B because they think Brand A is better, but because they are more certain that it is good.’

Behaviour comes first; attitude changes to keep up.

Consumers have a similar instinct – we would rather make a suboptimal decision in company than a perfect decision alone. This is also sensible, even if it isn’t conventionally ‘rational’ – a problem is much less worrying when shared.