Inside Influence Report
Is Sooner Better Than Later?
By Noah Goldstein, Ph.D.
Sometimes, no matter how hard we try, no matter how informed we are about how to persuade others effectively, we fall short. There can be dozens of reasons why an otherwise properly employed influence strategy fails to yield the desired results when trying to convince people to do something they should, but do not necessarily want, to do. Regardless of whether you’re trying to convince someone to support your favorite charity, eat healthier, or adopt a new way of doing things at the office, one of the most common explanations for lack of persuasion success is also one of the simplest: people recognize they should change their behavior, but they just don’t feel like doing it…right now.
According to research conducted by social psychologists Yaacov Trope and Nira Liberman (2003), people think about events that occur in the near future and events that occur in the distant future quite differently. Whereas people tend to think about near future events in very concrete terms, they are more likely to think about events that seem far off in the future in very abstract terms. For example, if your coworkers volunteer for a weekend at a local homeless shelter, their evaluations of that task are likely to differ depending on whether you’re asking about the upcoming weekend or a weekend eight months from now. If you are asking them about the upcoming weekend, your coworkers are likely to focus on the concrete costs they will incur if they agree to volunteer. For instance, they may focus on the fact that they won’t have the opportunity to go shopping, watch television, or catch up on sleep due to their volunteering. On the other hand, if you are asking your coworkers about volunteering on a weekend eight months from now, they are much more likely to evaluate the proposition at a much more general level, including how the request relates to their own general values, morals, and ideology. What this translates to is that those considering the request to volunteer months from now are less likely to ask themselves whether they want to do it and more likely to ask themselves whether they should do it (“Is it the right thing to do?”). Realizing that being helpful is consistent with their values, they are more likely to say yes and to follow through with that commitment.
Behavioral scientists Todd Rogers and Max Bazerman (2008) call this strategy “future lock-in:” instead of asking people to agree to changes right away, ask them to agree to changes that will be implemented some time in the future. In one of their experiments, the researchers told study participants about a proposal to increase the price of gas 20 cents a gallon to help reduce overall gas consumption; however, half the participants were told the policy was going to be implemented as soon as possible, and the other half were told it would be implemented in four years. When the policy was expected to be in place immediately, only 26% supported it, but when it was expected to lie dormant for four years before being officially implemented, 41% supported it. The researchers ran several other experiments showing a similar effect in other important domains, such as charitable giving and health-related choices.
Researchers have shown the effectiveness of this technique in other critical domains, such as savings. For example, behavioral economists Richard Thaler and Shlomo Benartzi (2004) showed they could drastically boost participation rates in 401(k) plans in what is one of the most powerful demonstrations of this persuasion strategy. Using what they called the “Save More Tomorrow” program, rather than asking workers to participate in the program immediately, they instead asked workers to commit to putting a portion of their future salary increases into the plan. Although this program was successful for many reasons, one central reason is that it effectively shifted workers’ thoughts about the program from the concrete costs associated with it (“I’ll have less money in my paycheck each month.”) to how this program would help them achieve their broader values and goals (“I should do this because it’s important and the right thing to do for my family.”)
The results of this research suggest that if you believe you will encounter resistance with your requests for immediate behavior change, instead ask your audience to commit to the change for sometime in the future. For instance, if you are a manager trying to get employees to willingly embrace a new system or procedure, getting a head start by asking them to agree to the change three months from now will likely result in a great deal more compliance and commitment to the new process than asking them to willingly accept an immediate change. Sure, it’s better not to have to wait at all, but a little late is certainly better than never.
Sources:
Rogers, T. and Bazerman, M. H. (2008). Future lock-in: Future implementation increases selection of ‘should’ choices. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 106, 1-20.
Thaler, R. H., & Benartzi, S. (2004). Save More Tomorrow: Using behavioral economics to increase employee saving. Journal of Political Economy, 112, S164–S187.
Dr. Noah J. Goldstein is a faculty member at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. Dr. Goldstein's academic research and writing have been published in many of the premier scholarly outlets in psychology and business, including Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. His research has been featured in numerous media outlets, including New York Times, NPR’s Marketplace and the Harvard Business Review 2009 List of Breakthrough Ideas.
Behavioral scientists Todd Rogers and Max Bazerman (2008) call this strategy “future lock-in:” instead of asking people to agree to changes right away, ask them to agree to changes that will be implemented some time in the future. In one of their experiments, the researchers told study participants about a proposal to increase the price of gas 20 cents a gallon to help reduce overall gas consumption; however, half the participants were told the policy was going to be implemented as soon as possible, and the other half were told it would be implemented in four years. When the policy was expected to be in place immediately, only 26% supported it, but when it was expected to lie dormant for four years before being officially implemented, 41% supported it. The researchers ran several other experiments showing a similar effect in other important domains, such as charitable giving and health-related choices.
Researchers have shown the effectiveness of this technique in other critical domains, such as savings. For example, behavioral economists Richard Thaler and Shlomo Benartzi (2004) showed they could drastically boost participation rates in 401(k) plans in what is one of the most powerful demonstrations of this persuasion strategy. Using what they called the “Save More Tomorrow” program, rather than asking workers to participate in the program immediately, they instead asked workers to commit to putting a portion of their future salary increases into the plan. Although this program was successful for many reasons, one central reason is that it effectively shifted workers’ thoughts about the program from the concrete costs associated with it (“I’ll have less money in my paycheck each month.”) to how this program would help them achieve their broader values and goals (“I should do this because it’s important and the right thing to do for my family.”)
The results of this research suggest that if you believe you will encounter resistance with your requests for immediate behavior change, instead ask your audience to commit to the change for sometime in the future. For instance, if you are a manager trying to get employees to willingly embrace a new system or procedure, getting a head start by asking them to agree to the change three months from now will likely result in a great deal more compliance and commitment to the new process than asking them to willingly accept an immediate change. Sure, it’s better not to have to wait at all, but a little late is certainly better than never.
Sources:
Rogers, T. and Bazerman, M. H. (2008). Future lock-in: Future implementation increases selection of ‘should’ choices. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 106, 1-20.
Thaler, R. H., & Benartzi, S. (2004). Save More Tomorrow: Using behavioral economics to increase employee saving. Journal of Political Economy, 112, S164–S187.
Trope, Y., & Liberman, N. (2003). Temporal construal. Psychological Review, 110, 403–421
Dr. Noah J. Goldstein is a faculty member at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. Dr. Goldstein's academic research and writing have been published in many of the premier scholarly outlets in psychology and business, including Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. His research has been featured in numerous media outlets, including New York Times, NPR’s Marketplace and the Harvard Business Review 2009 List of Breakthrough Ideas.
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http://dreamlearndobecome.blogspot.com This posting was made my Jim Jacobs, President & CEO of Jacobs Executive Advisors. Jim also serves as Leader of Jacobs Advisors' Insurance Practice.
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