The Catalyst Quotes

“Chapter Five: Elvi
A few decades earlier and about two hundred thousand trillion kilometers from where she currently sat, a tiny node of active protomolecule in a biological matrix had entered the orbit of a planet called Ilus, hitchhiking on the gunship Rocinante.
As the uncanny semisentient intelligence of the protomolecule tried to make contact with other nodes in the gate builders’ long-dead empire, it woke up mechanisms that had been dormant for millions—or even billions—of years. The end result had been an ancient factory returning to life, a massive robot attack, the melting of one artificial moon, and the detonation of a power plant that nearly cracked the planet in two.
All in all, a really shitty experience.
So when Elvi’s team took the catalyst out of isolation in unexplored systems to do a similar if slightly better-controlled reaching out to the artifacts and remains (..)
Tiamat's Wrath”
― James S.A. Corey, Tiamat's Wrath

“Letting potential hires choose which dimension is more important makes them feel like they have more of an active role in the process—and hopefully satisfies their need to negotiate. By letting candidates choose between two options the boss is equally happy with, potential hires feel like they have more autonomy without making the boss any worse off.
It’s providing a menu: a limited set of options from which people can choose.”
― Jonah Berger, The Catalyst: How to Change Anyone's Mind

“Try to convince people to do something, and they spend a lot of time counterarguing. Thinking about all the various reasons why it’s a bad idea or why something else would be better. Why they don’t want to do what was suggested.
But give people multiple options, and suddenly things shift.
Rather than thinking about what is wrong with whatever was suggested, they think about which one is better. Rather than poking holes in whatever was raised, they think about which of the options is best for them. And because they’ve been participating, they’re much more likely to go along with one of them in the end.”
― Jonah Berger, The Catalyst: How to Change Anyone's Mind