RWL Newsletter #83 - live from #AOM2018
Greetings from the windy city! I am in Chicago this weekend at the Academy of Management annual conference where I will be presenting some of my research on the school to work transition for early careerist healthcare administrators.
I didn't set out to have a theme for this week, but as I was writing my notes for each of these links, I realized the theme could be cognitive error or cognitive failure. Entrepreneurship is really having an insight no one else has. Why is it that some people have those insights and others do not? What is it about some people's minds that functions differently than most everyone else's? Why do some people see things differently?
Read
What: THE 20-YEAR-OLD ENTREPRENEUR IS A LIE
http://mitsloan.mit.edu/newsroom/articles/the-20-year-old-entrepreneur-is-a-lie/
Why: I guess it's not too late for me - I could still be an entrepreneur! In fact, I'd be more likely to succeed now than when I was in my twenties. The salience of incredible successes like Jobs, Gates, Zuckerberg, Musk, Bezos, etc. tend to come to mind when we think "entrepreneur", but they are in fact the exception. Huge successes tend to be more memorable than more run of the mill successes, and so when we mentally reach for the definition of something, we come up with the most exceptional. This is called availability bias and is a well known cognitive error and it applies to many parts of our lives. So I provide this link both as a fun fact about entrepreneurship, and as a way of reflecting on availability bias.
Watch
What: Chip Conley on "3 Key Rules Around Innovation and Disruption" (6 minutes)
https://youtu.be/UAC6RruXJyU
Why: Chip Conley was a hotelier who sold his chain (Joei de Vivre) and became an early advisor to AirBnB. I have always been fascinated by innovation, and how individuals and organizations sustain it in the face of resistance to change.
The three rules:
1) Innovations arrive with foreshadowing
2) Innovations arise to meet an unmet need
3) The establishment jumps on the band wagon
Listen to the whole thing for context.
Listen
What: Conversations with Tyler, Michelle Dawson on Autism and Atypicality
https://medium.com/conversations-with-tyler/tyler-cowen-michelle-dawson-autism-research-dsm-f2a41b326e76
Why: This is a thoughtful exploration of some of the issues around how autism is understood. Dawson herself is autistic and has studied the topic extensively. This is not a preachy interview about inclusion. Instead it is the kind of discussion we should be having around diversity and some of the scientific literature's own cognitive errors.
Thanks for reading and see you next week! If you come across any interesting stories, won't you send them my way? I'd love to hear what you think of these suggestions, and I'd love to get suggestions from you. Feel free to drop me a line by e-mail, or you can tweet to me at @mbonica .
Also, if you find these links interesting, won’t you tell a friend? They can subscribe here: https://tinyletter.com/markbonica
Have a great weekend and do amazing things!
Mark
Mark J. Bonica, Ph.D., MBA, MS
Assistant Professor
Department of Health Management and Policy
University of New Hampshire
(603) 862-0598
mark.bonica@unh.edu
Health Leader Forge Podcast: http://healthleaderforge.org
"I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor." - Henry David Thoreau