It’s a lot easier than being right.

My wife is a SAT/ACT tutor. One principle she teaches is that, on multiple choice tests, a key to success is eliminating the answers you know to be wrong. Then, if you don’t know the correct answer, guess – don’t leave an answer blank. This is a valuable approach that can be applied to many situations.

It certainly applies to qualitative research. I’ve found that a good way to use qualitative when evaluating multiple alternatives (such as new product ideas or advertising executions) is to eliminate the weakest ones. In other words, focus on not being wrong, rather than on being right. I once wrote a newsletter on this very topic.

We often delay decisions because we’re seeking the correct answer. But, thinking there’s one right answer is unwise and reductionist. Most situations have multiple right answers and lots of wrong ones. Even if there is one correct answer, you may never have sufficient information to identify it. The key to success over time is identifying the wrong alternatives, avoiding them, deciding quickly among the possible right ones, and moving on.

Not being wrong and being right are very different skills.

Being right is all about precision. It’s hitting your target dead center. By definition, there’s no room for error, so this is an exacting and demanding challenge.

Not being wrong is more about accuracy. If a specific answer is in the range of where the right answer is known to be, and out of the range of what we know is incorrect, it’s accurate – you’re definitely not wrong. Clearly, this is a less arduous task.

It’s important to remember that eliminating wrong alternatives is ultimately a risk-reduction strategy. Once you reduce the risk in a situation to an acceptable level, go ahead—make a decision. Failure is still possible, and you’re still taking a risk, but you’ve increased the chance of success and reduced the likelihood of catastrophe. That said, it’s also important to remember that there’s a difference between minimizing risk and never taking a risk. If you never take chances, and never fail, you’ll never do anything unprecedented.

A key question is: how much precision does a given situation really require? Is accuracy enough? A lot of the time, not being wrong is sufficient to get you to success. However, any neurosurgeons or air traffic controllers reading this should ignore those last three sentences. They definitely don’t apply to you.

A final thought. Sometimes, the only way to figure out what’s truly right, is first to be wrong. Failure is often our greatest teacher. And anyway, if you’ve never been wrong, you’re probably not trying hard enough.

I was chatting with a building contractor I know. Harry had just bought a new table saw, and was very excited.

“No way you can be without a table saw in this business,” he told me.  “It cuts a ton of wood accurately and super quick. But, if you’re not careful, it’ll take your arm off.” This is important wisdom with broad applications. There are a lot of powerful tools we can’t do without that can do damage beyond the value they provide if not treated with respect.

That’s certainly true in my profession, qualitative research. Qualitative is a foundational tool for marketers and researchers. But, when designed, executed, or analyzed poorly, it can lead to bad decisions with disastrous consequences— I’m looking at you, Crystal Pepsi!

Here are a few more essential power tools that must be used with care:

The Profit Motive. The desire for economic gain is a powerful force. Market mechanisms shape our world, and are largely responsible for our high standard of living. Don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely a capitalist. But it’s easy to see the consequences of capitalism gone off the rails. Look no further than the history of the tobacco industry as an example. You could make this same argument about socialism – it’s a useful economic tool that, if misused, can really mess things up.

Intuition. It’s amazing and can advance thinking and analysis with tremendous speed. But intuition must also be viewed with skepticism, lest it lead you badly astray. I devoted a newsletter to this topic recently.

The Criminal Justice System. A functioning police and legal system is essential to a safe and free society. However, it can’t do everything. For instance, for over 100 years we have tried to use it to solve the problem of substance abuse, despite the obvious fact that this is a public health problem. So, all we’ve done is create crime and suffering. Furthermore, if a society doesn’t provide its criminal justice system with sufficient resources, it will do its job poorly, often making things worse.

Prescription Drugs. Modern pharmaceuticals are wonders of technology, enabling us to cure previously incurable diseases. The amount of suffering and death they have prevented can’t be overstated. However, it’s also possible for doctors to become overly reliant on the prescription pad. Many afflictions are better addressed through lifestyle interventions.

Ultimately, one key to success in the world is being able to use tools that are both indispensable and immensely powerful with respect and skill. Remember – the factors that make these tools so powerful are often what also make them potentially dangerous. I’d love your thoughts on other powerful tools that we can’t avoid but must use with caution.

It’s great to learn from your own mistakes, but even better to learn from somebody else’s. 

When I worked in client-side marketing, I took a job managing new products. This was a responsibility I’d never had before, as my previous positions had been on established businesses. This business unit had a near-zero success rate when it came to new product introductions, so my first priority was to identify factors that might explain the high failure rate. One commonality I found was that many of the new product concepts the company had tested quantitatively and qualitatively were fatally flawed, making failure nearly inevitable.

This served as a course on how to write concepts – I learned from the mistakes I found and was able to put this knowledge to good use. In other words, I learned to write new product concepts by first learning how not to write them.

We all make mistakes. That’s part of life. In fact, if you’re not making mistakes, it means that either you’re not trying hard enough, or you’re not taking risks. You’ll never accomplish much with that approach.

Learning from your mistakes is a fundamental life skill. However, by itself it’s insufficient for success. If you’re going to stay ahead of the pack, you also need to learn from the mistakes of others – another essential life skill. You might even say that this is a little-known superpower. There’s actually a technical term for gaining knowledge from others’ experiences: ‘social learning.’

It’s preferable to learn from others’ mistakes than your own, for a number of reasons:

Your ego interferes with learning from your own mistakes. You’re emotionally detached from other people’s mess-ups. While it’s hard to view your own mistakes objectively – or even to admit you’ve made a mistake at all – taking a clear-eyed look at somebody else’s error is not so difficult. It can actually boost your own ego. There’s probably no better way to feel smug and self-satisfied than the realization that you didn’t make the same mistake the other guy made.

The consequences are not yours to bear. When it’s your own mistake, you must shoulder the costs and clean things up. Not so when it’s somebody else’s misstep. You get to observe from a distance and chart a better course while they deal with the mess.

There are just more mistakes from which to learn. The quantity of other people’s mistakes you can observe will always dwarf your own. Thus, observing and learning from the mistakes of others – social learning – is a force multiplier.

So, make a practice of learning from the mistakes of your fellow humans. Remember – if they’re smart, they’re learning from yours, so you might as well return the favor.

Maybe We’re Not All Completely Greedy and Evil.

Recently, at a local coffee shop, my wife – who had been keeping count – told me that I‘d consumed six cups of coffee over two hours for one low price of $2.89. She observed that I would never have done that if the shop charged for refills. My inner economist called out: “moral hazard!”

You might not have heard of moral hazard, but it strongly influences our thinking. It’s the assumption that we act irresponsibly when there are no negative consequences – in other words, if we know somebody else will absorb the cost, we act recklessly, and even antisocially. It’s a pervasive mindset in our culture, and is at the heart of a lot of our disagreements.

• When elected officials demand that public assistance programs be time-limited and linked to work, a moral hazard mindset is probably driving that rhetoric. They are assuming that, without restrictions, participants in these programs will exploit them indefinitely.

• When parents or child-rearing experts espouse the necessity of setting ‘firm boundaries,’ or clear consequences for children, moral hazard thinking is probably lurking beneath the surface. The idea is that, without boundaries and consequences, kids will just take advantage of their parents.

This idea frequently emerges in the qualitative research I conduct. I once moderated several studies on health insurance, conducting over 150 interviews and groups with healthcare providers, administrators and consumers. I found a widespread perception that, if healthcare services and products are too easily accessible, people will use them wastefully.

I also encounter this idea frequently in social situations. Listen to conversations these days about things like bank bailouts and the social safety net. The opinions people express are strongly informed by a moral hazard mindset.

Where does this idea come from? And, more importantly, is it true?

Let’s start with its origin. The concept of moral hazard comes to us from the field of economics, dating back to the 17^th century. Since then, it has been widely studied as a source of economic inefficiency.

And, is it true? The accurate answer is ‘it’s complicated.’ It’s clear that, in the context of health insurance, the influence of moral hazard is – according to healthcare economist Uwe Reinhardt – ‘overblown.’ He points out that people dislike going to doctors and taking medication, making it unlikely that being insured will lead them to consume healthcare excessively. There is also quite a bit of data that backs him up.

And yet, there’s no denying that moral hazard is a real thing.

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Why do I bring all this up? Because moral hazard is a highly influential idea. I encounter it – usually unspoken – all the time when conducting market research, it frequently arises in conversation with friends and family, and it plays an enormous role in formulating government policies.

It’s undeniable that moral hazard exists. Remember the six cups of coffee? Clearly, coffee isn’t healthcare. Jeff, the café owner, told me that he was fine with this – the economics of a cup of coffee are so favorable that he still makes good money on freeloaders like me. If he didn’t, he would limit refills. He also finds that his loyal customers like the policy, and believes that it creates an atmosphere of trust and shared purpose among his customers and employees.

It’s important to understand that moral hazard is a mindset – a set of assumptions that shape our interpretation of the world around us. Specifically, it’s a moral mindset – it assumes that people are inherently wicked and greedy, and that they will engage in antisocial behavior if they are insulated from the consequences of that behavior.

Those for whom this mindset plays an important role assume that people will invariably act immorally given the opportunity, and that we gain little from having faith in others. Others tend to be more trusting of their fellow humans. Furthermore, as evolutionary biologists have observed, selflessness and altruism clearly exist across many species.  So, if you find yourself disagreeing with a friend, family member or politician, consider the possibility that different assumptions about moral hazard are the source of that disagreement, and take this as an opportunity to engage in some thoughtful conversation.

Over the past three years we’ve been interacting with others online a lot more, and in person a lot less. On one hand, I’m grateful the online tools exist. Not only would all of my fellow qualitative researchers and I have been out of business without them, but they enabled me to spend time with friends and family I might not otherwise have been able to see.

On the other hand, the level of nuance and engagement we get from online interactions pales next to what we get in-person. So, it’s been great getting back to seeing people face-to-face. I’ve also been very happy to be doing quite a bit more face-to-face qualitative research over the past ten months than in the previous couple of years.

In-person contact provides those all-important non-verbal cues: body language, gestures, facial expressions, and tone of voice. Sometimes you can pick those up on a video call, but not nearly as much as when you’re actually there. Non-verbals are clues to people’s emotional states and attitudes. They can tell you when someone is kidding or being sarcastic, honest or deceptive, anxious or offended. They help build rapport during conversation. This is why I’ve been encouraging my clients to get back to face-to-face research when possible.

I’ve also been making use recently of tools that detect non-verbal cues when conducting online research, specifically online eye tracking and facial coding. Both work through the research respondent’s own webcam, so no additional hardware is required. How can these tools help us?

Eye tracking is useful when conducting research involving some sort of stimulus, such as an advertisement, a package mockup, or a webpage. It can show which elements in the stimulus are drawing attention, and how long people are focusing on those elements.

Facial coding captures involuntary micro-expressions that are not discernable to the naked eye, and that reveal the respondent’s emotional state. Sometimes people aren’t honest about their emotions at a given time, or may not even be aware of them. But micro-expressions give them away.

While it would be overstating to say these tools replicate the advantages of in-person interaction, they do serve to increase the insights we can draw from online experiences – giving us more bang for our research buck.