How behavioural insights builds better leaders

Finding and retaining good employees is always a challenge for business leaders, HR and recruitment professionals. But in recent years Brexit, the pandemic, lockdowns, war, and spiralling inflation have made things even harder.

While no magic wand, behavioural insights – or “nudge theory” – can tilt the playing field back to the benefit of HR teams and organisational leaders.

If you thought nudging was just for politicians and the public sector, think again. A new Executive Education course this November by BIT – The Behavioural Insights Team (also known as The Nudge Unit) – is specifically aimed at leaders in the private sector who would like to know more about how these little changes can have big impacts for their organisations and make them better managers and leaders.

Over many years and thousands of studies in the real world with real employers, BIT has built up a bank of knowledge of what works to recruit, retain and motivate employees and help organisations develop more inclusive leaders.

For example, BIT research found that offering part-time working or job share opportunities increased applicant pools by 50% at John Lewis and increased applications from women to senior roles by 19% at Zurich Insurance. BIT’s team in Sydney developed behavioural interventions for the Australian Civil Service that reduced the gender gap between men and women reapplying for senior roles from 45% to just 4%, while a major trial with jobsite Indeed found the seemingly simple change of explicitly mentioning flexibility on job adverts boosted applications by up to 30%.

In other words, any employers not spelling out their openness to flexible working are needlessly cutting themselves off from large numbers of qualified and interested candidates.

And that’s not the only thing recruiters may be unwittingly doing that exclude good candidates. The common practice in many ads of describing requirements using character traits can actively discourage women and ethnic minority applicants from applying to a position because they may not identify with those traits.

Women and ethnic minority candidates are however more likely to apply when requirements are described as behaviours that can be evidenced and are tangible and definable. This helps applicants understand what a role involves and what’s expected.

So:

Yes, these are small changes, but the evidence shows they make big and meaningful differences.

Of course, finding good colleagues is only part of the challenge – retention is no less important a challenge for leaders and managers. Here, BIT has also done very salient work which forms part of the upcoming Executive Education programme.

For example in the US a BIT project found that carefully designed, behaviourally-informed interactive emails to employees in high stress situations decreased rates of burnout by a significant 8 points, resignations were cut by more than half and the savings from reduced illness, absenteeism and turnover were real and substantial. The team calculated that a mid-sized city in the US could, by taking this approach, save at least £300,000 a year.

BIT’s Applying behavioural science to business challenges is a one-day Executive Education programme. There are two opportunities to join this programme in November with courses taking place in central London on 2 and 9 November for leaders in HR and organisational change as well as all functions across business. It will combine interactive lectures, case study discussions, experiential learning and activities to share not just the results of BIT’s extensive work such as the projects mentioned above, but crucially the behavioural factors and learnings behind them and their outcomes.

Unlike other Executive Education programmes, this focuses on action and application rather than conceptual theories. This means that on completion, course participants will have a new set of practical psychological tools and methods that they can immediately apply to drive measurable improvements within their organisation.

Topics covered will include how to:

• Gain a deep understanding of the factors that drive the behaviour of employees, partners and customers.
• Build awareness of systematic cognitive biases and traps that hamper strategic decision making.
• Apply practical tools and techniques to improve the quality of decision making and to better guide teams’ decisions.
• Design more effective solutions to business challenges using behavioural insights.
• Use tried-and-tested BIT methodologies to implement change effectively and run successful projects.

The cost for this unique and new programme is £1200 per attendee, including a follow-up coaching session and one hour ‘Introduction to Behavioural Insights’ masterclass that can be delivered virtually to your team or organisation within 90 days of the course.

Find out more and register here https://www.bi.team/applying-behavioural-science-to-business-challenges/