Archives of “Dan Ariely” tag

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Pizza Proves to Be the Best Motivator

  
Analysis, Education
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In the upcoming book “Payoff: the Hidden Logic that Shapes Our Motivations,” behavioral economist Dan Ariely detailed a study showing that pizza motivates workers to increase productivity more effectively than money.
Looking for a way to encourage your employees to show better results? The answer might be pizza.

In his book, Ariely recounts an experiment conducted at an Intel  semiconductor factory in Israel. For the experiment, factory employees were split into four groups, three of which were promised a reward if they managed to complete stated goals by the end of the day.
Members of the first group were offered about $30 cash apiece. The second group was told that they would receive a compliment from their boss, and members of the third group would get vouchers for pizzas. (more…)

Our Favorite Non-Investing Books About Investing

  
  Education
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A few people have asked me over the past couple of weeks to share some of my favorite books outside of finance that are applicable to investing. The majority of these books are based on psychology because it plays such an important role in making better investment decisions. Here’s my list:

Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think by Brian Wansink
The analogy between your finances and losing weight has been used over and over again throughout the years. It’s a useful analogy because the decisions in both activities are mainly affected by people’s behavior (or a lack of behavioral change). A couple of my favorites stats from this book: (1) People make an average of over 200 food-related decisions each day and (2) It’s estimated that 95% of all people who lose weight on a diet gain it all back.

Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini
This one has been recommended by Charlie Munger on a number of occasions so I finally read it this year. It’s one of the best psychology books I’ve ever read. This book really helps you step into the shoes of the mind of a marketer or sales-person trying to get you interested in their product. These people are masters at getting into people’s heads to get them to act. Cialdini also touches on the social proof theory, which states that most people look to see what others are doing to figure out acceptable behavior. (more…)

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