As speakers at conferences, commentators quoted in articles, and respondents to surveys, law department lawyers convey their preferences. Those expressed preferences, however, may not translate into practice. Hypocrisy is too strong a term, but often there is a failure to walk the talk, a gap between espoused values and acted…
An excellent article, Dan P. Lovallo and Olivier Sibony, ‘”Distortions and deceptions in strategic decisions,” McKinsey Quarterly, 2006, No. 1 at 21, presents among its many ideas three that I want to mark (See my post of Jan. 17, 2006 for other points from this article.). A general counsel might…
The long and unusual site on leadership decision making, hosted by Prof. Hossein Arsham describes a tool to help make decisions: grid analysis. According to Arsham, it is most effective where you have a number of good alternatives and many factors to take into account when you evaluate those alternatives.…
An idiosyncratic site on leadership decision making, hosted by Prof. Hossein Arsham, explains how paired comparison analysis can help a law department manager work out the importance of a number of options relative to each other. It is particularly useful where you do not have objective data to base the…
Prof. Hossein Arsham’s website gives a useful summary of the oft-cited chapeaux, from De Bono Edward, Six Thinking Hats: An Essential Approach to Business Management, Little Brown & Co, 1985. The hats are a useful metaphor to push us to weight decisions from various perspectives. The conceit also helps unravel…
William Bertrand, the general counsel of MedImmune, recalled a comment: “Out of the 100 decisions you make each week, maybe 20 are important. The other 80 need to be made,” in GC Mid-Atlantic, May 2006 at 6. The remark set me thinking, in part because the highest compliment is that…
Observations. This blog has hundreds of observations – “This law department does or did something.” The department observed could be one-of-a-kind, or it could be among the lemmings. Trends. Multiple observations of a similar activity leads to talk of a trend. The word trend leaves the impression of a prediction:…
The emerging field of neuro-economics, not more than ten years old, studies the activity of neurons in the brain, polygraph-like sensors, and eye movements to understand better how humans think. For example, according to the NY Times, April 20, 2006 at C3 researchers have determined that “when people think about…
Isaiah Berlin, historian of ideas, distinguished hedgehogs – people who know one big thing – from foxes – who know many little things. Hedgehogs fit what they learn into a world view. Foxes improvise explanations case by case. A column by John Kay, in the Fin. Times, June 20, 2006…
Studies have shown that most people would flip a switch to divert a train if that would kill one person but save five; yet, those same people, if they had to physically push one person off a bridge to save five people, refuse. According to the Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2006…