Customer Crossroads

Truth, lies and feedback (Part 4 final amazing installment)

I've been posting for a few days on this topic of how to get truthful feedback. Here are the links to Part 1 which poses a question, Part 2 about how to seek face-to-face feedback, and Part 3 which is about a questionnaire virtually designed to elicit falsehood.

Today, I want to look at the most challenging of all truth-finding situations, the police investigator.

This is a situation that makes the work of commercial interviewers of all sorts look like absolute child's play. People generally volunteer to talk to us, most times we actually pay them. The worst downside they are likely to experience is cognitive dissonance or perhaps embarrassment, possibly boredom.

The legal investigator, of course, is faced with someone highly motivated to lie for a number of reasons, social, cultural, psychological and rational. Everything is working against them.

This is why I found a recent presentation I attended by Donna M. Pence, a retired Special Agent who is now an educator, so totally absorbing.

If I was marketing her course, I'd probably call it something like impossible interviews, but she called her topic "When getting the truth is critical: Interviewing techniques used by law enforcement professionals".

It's not like on TV

One of the most interesting things Ms. Pence mentioned was the length of time spent preparing for, setting up, and actually interviewing.

There's the interview-before-the-interview, which is designed to develop a sense of who the subject is, how they respond to non-threatening questions, and even what their general comprehension level is. Then they seek to understand the answer style when under pressure, in a state of fear or anxiety. The protocol she teaches is called PEACE: Preparation, Engagement, Account, Closure, Evaluation.

She was very clear that every question asked has to have a defensible purpose that will withstand questioning in court. No "fishing expeditions" allowed.  This is a key difference from insight  research work -- our questions need to have a purpose, and do, but we are almost always going on a fishing expedition.

When you expect everyone to lie, you plan differently

Like a good insight seeker or facilitator, the good law enforcement interviewer sets the stage in terms of the environment, privacy, clothing, tone and manner, the actual interview space. They consider gender, ethnic and racial matching (matching or deliberately unmatching).

Unlike insight researchers, they are often seeking to disarm or destabilize. We saw her shift roles and accents like a skilled actor, and honestly, I was really glad I wasn't interacting with her professionally, so to speak!

The level of detail required to support criminal charges is, in her words, "excruciating". So one thing that is probably true from TV is the phrase "let's go over this again".

I truly loved some of her phrasing. Let me give you an example:

"I've never called anybody a liar. I say, 'I think you're not being as truthful as you could be.'  Or for a good ole boy, 'That dawg won't hunt'"

My top takeaways

These are approaches that we can all learn from, whether you are interviewing, or just trying to be a better communicator.

[1] Cognitive interviewing -- show the subject that you see them as an individual with a unique set of needs. In turn, present yourself as an identifiable person. Depersonalizing reduces the amount of information you will obtain/receive.

[2] Interact meaningfully -- don't just ask a list of predetermined questions.

[3] Communicate empathy -- see the situation from their point of view.

[4] Give your undivided attention -- convey that you want to listen and can be trusted. Give reassurance and support.

[5] Let them talk until they run out of steam.

Why does anyone talk to them?

The most amazing part, for me, was Ms. Pence's answer to my question of why anyone really talks to them, despite her persuasive methods. Her answer provided telling insight into the human condition.

For the most part, she says her tone is clear, calm, slow and matter-of-fact. She has often interviewed people who have violated foundational cultural taboos, such as child molesters, rapists, murderers.  She says things like, "You can't offend, embarass or surprise me", "I'm not going to be upset at anything you tell me. I've talked to many people in your situation".

While people are initially motivated to talk to get themselves out of trouble, if possible, they also want to give their side of the story, to provide an explanation for what happened. 

My take

We all live the existential problem -- we are alone in our own experience. The ability to share that inner world -- even a little bit -- is a powerful drug. I often wondered how law enforcement officers get people to tell them the truth, and I think this is the essence of it: empathy.

And on a less sobering note, if you meet someone like Ms. Pence in a police station, you are in serious big trouble, because she is one amazing interviewer.

Resources

Donna Pence recommends the book, Telling Lies: Clues to Deceit in the Marketplace, Politics, and Marriage, by Dr. Paul Eckman

All of the graphics in this post were created by me, based on diagrams presented by Ms. Pence.

I heard Ms. Pence speak at the annual QRCA conference. If you love qualitative methods, you should join us sometime.

Truth, lies and feedback (part 3)

I've been posting about truth, lies and feedback -- you can read the previous posts here and here.

On the same trip to Baja Mexico referenced earlier, we were traveling while the H1N1 situation [scare? epidemic? what are we calling it now?] was still rolling. Going in and out of Mexico, we had to pass through an extra screening at the airport.

There was a woman on our outbound trip who wore a face mask on the plane. Whether worn to protect herself or others was not clear to me, as she seemed the picture of health. But the mask quickly disappeared before we left the plane.

Both times, we had to fill in a small questionnaire and have our temperature taken and recorded on the same slip of paper. Questions had things like "have you had a fever in the past week", "do you have symptoms ...", and weirdly, our e-mail address.

It wasn't totally clear what would happen to you if you answered yes to any of these questions. Or what would happen if you had an elevated temperature. Most people likely assumed, as I did, that we might be denied passage.

The real mystery here is why anyone would answer such a questionnaire honestly. I would guess that most of the questionnaires were completed with a line of "no" answers.

The whole procedure was so apparently meaningless that I thought it was an exercise in government relations.

There are times people are really inclined to lie. This was definitely one of them.

I recently heard a law enforcement specialist speak about this topic, and it was fascinating. I'll cover that in the next post.

[Meanwhile, if anyone can shed light on the temperature screening process, please take a minute and add a comment.]

Truth lies and feedback (part 2)

I mentioned the story of my kayak guide asking for feedback before the trip was over in the previous post. It's pretty easy to see why we all provided something less than full and frank disclosure to this man.

• We liked the guy. Despite our gripes, we now had something of a social relationship with him, after several days of constant contact.  SOCIAL INFLUENCES

• We were painfully aware of our abundant wealth compared to most everyone we encountered, including our guide. As right-thinking liberal minded educated persons, we didn't want to place inappropriate expectations on someone from a less developed country without our advantages. At it's worst, this pattern is the bigotry of low expectations. But I'm going to call it just CULTURAL INFLUENCES

• This person was in a position of significant influence. Not only was he cooking our meals, we were entrusting him with our safety in a wilderness environment. POWER INFLUENCES

• In a couple of days, we'd be on an airplane headed home. Why risk damaging the last couple of days of our holiday just to give him some feedback? RISK REWARD IMBALANCE

The other traveler in our small group assumed there would be an internet questionnaire when we got home. But there wasn't. So the guide, wanting feedback, was left to his own resources.

How to ask for feedback in person

In this situation, our guide could have obtained much better and more informative feedback by changing his questioning strategy. 

First, he needed to leverage the social connection more to make us feel more obliged to help. For example, he might say how much he valued our opinion as the wonderful people we were, and how important it was to his livelihood to stay competitive.

Then, he could have avoided some of the other challenges by asking us for future help, not past commentary. His question might go something like this:

"I'm thinking about making some changes to improve this trip for next time. What things would you change if you were me? What things would you definitely keep?"

The strategy here is to focus on what can be changed -- the future -- rather than the past. Clearly solicit both positive and negative. Shift the discussion away from the person to the activity or behavior.

Balanced feedback

In coaching, this technique is called balanced feedback. You provide the positives, and you provide the "next time", future oriented feedback.

At the end of events I facilitate, I often ask people to put up sticky notes under three headings: do more of, do less of, do the same. Sticky notes create the feeling of anonymity. But inevitably, in the debrief, people will volunteer to explain their sticky note. The "do less" column is the negatives, of course.

If there are no negatives in your feedback, this is a big clue that you're not getting the whole story.

[Unless of course your customer experience truly IS perfect. In which case, please get in touch, because I'd like to interview you for this blog.] 

Your thoughts?

On truth, lies and feedback (part 1)

How many times this month have you already been asked for feedback or invited to fill in some kind of a questionnaire? Take a minute...

Probably quite a few.

When we are the people seeking the information, we tend to act as if the answers we get are generally truthful. Maybe not a good assumption.

I've been thinking about this a bit, and will be looking at the issue from a few angles in the next couple of posts.

One of the situations that got me thinking was on a recent holiday. My beloved and I were on a kayak trip in Baja, with one other traveler and our guide. We were a good day's paddle away from civilization, and had about a day and a half left in our trip. Our guide was also our cook, and was about to make dinner. 

He asked what we thought of the guiding on the trip, in almost those exact words.

As you might suspect, none of us chose that moment to say anything that wasn't completely positive and flattering, even though we had been muttering amongst ourselves about our various gripes.

The guide seemed quite satisfied with our response and said, "That's usually what I hear. I've never had a complaint".

Maybe you've noticed something like this yourself?

Multiculturalism: what's really going on

I had the pleasure of hearing Will Kymlicka from Queen's University speak on the topic of multiculturalism at a CIFAR event recently. Fascinating topic, and his paper on the subject is available here.

Multiculturalism in this context does not mean having a lot of immigrants in your society -- it actually references a policy about supporting cultural heritage for immigrants, as opposed to a policy of assimilation.

If you are running a business in a nation with a lot of immigrants -- and who is not, now? -- you need to consider that the mindset of your customers may not be what you think or expect it to be.

Some excellent research has been compiled and analyzed by Dr. Kymlicka, some of it showing surprising results.

Let me see if I can distill this down to the key points. [But you should read the paper, it is fascinating stuff.]

[1] the debate on this subject is highly ritualized, and hasn't changed much in the 35 years Canada has had a formal policy. But it needs to change now, because the situation has actually changed.

[2] success of such a policy is measured in terms of economic, political and social integration of immigrants. According to Dr. Kymlicka:  "On all of these dimensions, there is growing evidence that immigrants to Canada fare better than most if not all other Western democracies." [WD for short] 

I was actually surprised to hear this. Which shows you how often public discourse is dominated by positions, not facts.

Immigrants to Canada are more likely to become citizens, more likely to vote, more likely to run for political office than in other western democracies. There are more foreign-born citizens elected to Parliament than in any other WD, in numbers and as a percentage.

Dr. Kymlicka's conclusions are striking in their directness:

"The evidence generated by these recent studies – all of which appeared from 2006 to 2008 – provide strong evidence that multiculturalism in Canada promotes integration and citizenship, both through its individual-level effects on attitudes, self-understandings and identities, and through its society-level effects on institutions."

[3] There has been some apparent pulling back from multicultural policies, notably by the Dutch, but not only them. "If we look below the surface, we find that several de facto multiculturalist programs remain in place in several European countries even when their governments disavow the term – the “retreat” from multiculturalism is more rhetorical than real."

Many of the problems attributed to multiculturalism in other countries don't have strong factual support.

[4] There are real issues, however. Religion is the big one. Immigration in Canada was largely from Judeo-Christian traditions until relatively recently. So people brought with them values that were not at all in conflict with the core values of the population. 

As you have likely noticed, this is no longer the case.

As Dr. Kymlicka points out, we can't expect the Supreme Court to adjudicate every problem -- we need to come to some kind of public consensus about what is reasonable and what isn't.

Media is another real issue. Who can forget the Danish cartoon debacle?

In Canada, we have constitutionally entrenched rights for founding groups: English, French and Aboriginal. We're going to have to figure out how multiculturalism fits in. 

Racism and discrimination have not gone away. Many of our institutional responses relate to "visible minorities" but this distinction doesn't adequately describe many groups experiencing discrimination. Anti-Muslim predjudice is not the same as anti-black predjudice as anti-Aboriginal predjudice. [Yup, it's complicated.]

Finally, the economic progress of recent immigrants is far below that of previous generations of immigrants. They take longer to catch up to the mainstream.

Resources:

Will Kymlicka, The Current State of Multiculturalism in Canada. Downloaded 2009.

Co-creation watch: Hackerlabs and the democratization of creation

Human beings are by nature creators and builders. The evidence of this surrounds us. We have created many, many tools to support this enduring enterprise, ranging from oil paints and violins to concrete and laser-cutters.

In the not-too-distant past, the act of creation was highly stratified. There were fine artists, or those striving to be. There were craftspeople, like Gepetto the shoemaker (aka Pinocchio's father, who dreamed of having a real son). There may have been many stonemasons, but there were few Berninis, and they lived in an elite place.

This segregation of high and low creation has been pervasive throughout the world of work and in recent times too. I recall being told in no uncertain terms by a senior executive that I was not a creative person, only some people were creative, and that when creativity was needed, it would be hired, thank you very much. I doubt that was an isolated conversation. Even in creative industries, the true creatives were housed in special cages.

This is all changing. 

Crafts used to be denigrated as "low art", somehow a lesser act of creation. The same was true of graphic design -- if it was produced for commercial reasons, it shouldn't be framed an hung on a wall. There is a shrinking community of people who actually care about these distinctions now. Case in point: Etsy, an online craft market and community. Yes, some of this stuff is perfectly hideous. But much of it is charming. Anyone can get in on the act here, including children.

Although many strive to make a living with their shops, I suspect that many more just want to share their creations with the world. This motive is surely part of what drives Instructables, a place where you can share your approach to making Lego shaped gummy candies.

 

In fact, these communities have their own ideas about what makes something wonderful.

Customized manufacturing is another sign on this creation highway. You can go questing for amazing sneakers in your local hip neighborhood, or you can quest for them online, or you can design your own. And it's not just sneakers anymore.  (Levi's tried to pull off something like this more than a decade ago, but they didn't quite get it right, or perhaps were also a bit too soon. It was custom fit, not custom design, for one thing.)  If you are an actual designer in the sneaker world, keeping your job may depend on being at least as good as the free stuff coming in.

And it's not just sneakers. The tools of big-time industrial creativity are fast becoming available to people. 3D scanners and printers -- and the aforementioned laser cutters -- are now within the range of affordability, just as desktop printers became affordable. And they are going to get more affordable. The real question is whether you'll buy these things in the tool corral at Home Depot, or in the electronics section at Best Buy.

Today, I discovered another wonderful sign of these times in Hackerspace. 

 

Here's how my local Hackerspace describes itself -- "a community space with a diverse membership, including artists, computer programmers, web designers, and hardware hackers. It is inspired by the philosophies of the global hackerspaces movement which encourages people to socialize, share knowledge, and work together on their projects."

 

Hackerspaces reminds me of the unconferences that have sprung up all over the place -- loosely organized groups of people getting things done.

New communications technologies is what has made all of this possible, in many ways, but it is as much a servant as a driver of the change we are seeing. Tools, access to people, and now access to physical space, are all becoming liberated from their place in the stratification.

The change is the great democratization of creation.

Resources

3D Printing and scanning: Wikipedia has a good overview here, Jay Leno wrote for Popular Mechanics on this topic, and there is a delightful YouTube with a demonstration.

Related posts

Creation and customization: here to stay and growing. Susan Abbott on CustomerCrossroads blog, Sept 29, 2009

Where customization is going. Susan Abbott on CustomerCrossroads blog, Oct 30, 2008

Get your own car logo, make your own stickers. Co-creation is everywhere. Susan Abbott on CustomerCrossroads blog, Mar 31, 2008

People don't always know what they want: the suburban dilemma

I live in one of those old-fashioned grid-street neighborhoods, where many of the houses are on narrow lots. Although it was built as a suburb, it was built before 1950s suburban cul-de-sac design became the norm.

When we moved here we wanted to be walking distance from a destination neighborhood -- that was our key criteria in a home. Which meant we paid much more for much less space than we could have had living farther from the city core. But we love it, as most people do who live in these areas. But cities stopped building neighborhoods like this.

Enter the cul-de-sac: what buyers want

The suburbs built in the last several decades are filled with large lots and dead-end streets. They are the suburban ideal, bucolic and pretty, where families play together in the backyard, and neighbors smile and wave as they leave the house to drive to work. At least that's the picture we are shown in advertising and developer marketing.

Developers continue to justify these community designs based on consumer demand. A few progressive cities are trying to stop these kinds of neighborhoods, and meeting a wall of resistance from real estate developers.

Surely developers know what their customers want. They know what sells, too -- the pie-shaped lots on culs-de-sac are the first to sell. Buyers say they are safer for their children. And they look pretty.

The problem

Here's the problem with cul-de-sac neighborhoods. The houses work great, but the neighborhoods don't.

You can't cut through those neighborhoods, so the congestion at rush hour rivals the downtown core, even on multi-lane arterial boulevards.

You can walk, but there's no where to walk to. So you have to have a car for everyone of driving age. The densities are too low to support public transit without massive subsidies.

All this driving affects health, according to some researchers -- not just from atmospheric pollution, but from lack of exercise and the stress related to driving in traffic. (I note one study below that disagrees, but only looks at physical activity.)

Stay-at-home moms without cars can find themselves completely isolated and dependent.

It turns out that these neighborhoods aren't actually safer. Because there are fewer people, some crimes are more likely, and all crimes take longer to report. There are more traffic accidents in keyhole neighborhoods than there are on grid-streets. (Probably because driving all those curves makes people nuts after a while.) Getting help from ambulance or fire departments also takes longer.

In addition to all this, these neighborhoods cost much more to service for municipalities -- more to collect garbage, more to snow-plow and clean.

So why do we keep building them?

I would argue that people do not always know what makes them happy.

A few social scientists have investigated this, among them John Helliwell (not in terms of real estate, just to be clear). He says you can teach people to make better economic choices that make them happier with their decisions. But left to their own devices, people often make poor decisions.

I think this is the problem with the suburban neighborhood. If we did some straightforward consumer research, we would probably find that people prefer the cul-de-sac approach.

Raw purchasing power is also a factor, of course. People choose among the options they have, and few young families can afford the joys of a single family home in a city core, even if they see the merits. 

But this is starting to change. Some realtor sites now provide walkability scores with their listings.

As we start to really address our environmental and economic problems in the coming decade, we will need to figure out how to market things like better neighborhoods and higher densities.

Resources:

Fast Company blog: Death to Dead-Ends - Will the New Suburbia Omit Cul-de-sacs?, by Michael Cannell, Dec. 29, 2009 

John Michlig's blog: Sprawled Out: the Search for Community in the American Suburb. The whole blog relates to this topic, and has some great articles and links.

StatsCan research that suburbanites are just as active: Life in metropolitan areas Are suburban residents really less physically active? (based on 2005 data)

Find your neighborhood's walkability here: Walkscore

CEOs For Cities commissioned a study relating walkability to home value. Read the results here: Walking the Walk