Rotman Management – April 2019

8 / Rotman Management Spring 20 19

ROLE 1: BI as Problem Solver
Behavioural insights can enable an organization to address prob-
lems arising at ‘the last mile’—those moments where an end-user
directly interacts with your organization or its product or service.
Whether your last-mile issue is a low take-up rate, poor sales or
low conversion rates, BI can be harnessed to make subtle chang-
es to better align your product or service with human behaviour.
One of the key tools that enables problem-solving here is
the concept of ‘choice architecture’, whereby organizations pro-
actively design the ‘choice context’ in such a way as to steer or
nudge users in a particular direction. Following are the four main
types of decisions that choice architecture can influence:

COMPLIANCE. Getting people to act in accordance with a regulation
set by a government or agency (e.g., tax deadlines, regulatory pa-
perwork requirements).

SWITCHING. Getting people to convert from one choice to another
(e.g., brand switching, replacing soda with water at meals).

FOLLOWING THROUGH. Getting people to follow through on com-
mitments that they themselves have made (e.g., completing a
weight loss regimen, or just acting on intentions).

ACTIVE CHOOSING. Getting people to break undesired habits by
converting passive, mindless decisions into active choices.

It is fair to say that the biggest successes for BI to date have
come in the domain of choice architecture. For example, a few
years ago, Ontario’s Behavioural Insights Unit set out to increase
organ donations in the province. Working closely with project
partners Service Ontario and Trillium Gift of Life Network,
the team’s goal was to increase the number of people who regis-
ter as organ donors.
Initially, several ‘barriers to registration’ were identified,
including the length and complexity of the registration form,
failure to ask every customer if they wanted to register and ask-
ing customers to complete yet another transaction after they
had waited in line and completed other paperwork. The result:
By removing these barriers — and thereby enhancing the choice

architecture — registration rates increased by 143 per cent. The

organ donor registration process in Ontario was redesigned

based on the following choice architecture principles:

• Provide different versions of the donor registration form;


• Change the timing of when the form is handed out; and


• Offer additional information to help people make their
  decision.

ROLE 2: BI as Auditor

At the end of every design process for products, services or pro-

cesses, a behavioural scientist can be tasked with auditing the

outcome and evaluating it for human-centricity. In this role, BI

is used to evaluate and provide suggestions for further ‘human-

izing’ organizational outputs.

The federal government’s Impact and Innovation Unit (IIU),

along with BEAR, recently worked with the Canadian Armed

Forces (CAF) on its goal to increase the percentage of women in

its ranks from 15 to 25 per cent by the year 2026. The team used

a BI lens to audit the following stages of the recruitment process:

THE APPLICATION PROCESS. BI-informed changes were made to the

Armed Forces’ application form to increase clarity and under-

standing. Furthermore, the Department of National Defense

(DND) made improvements to the appointment process and

recruitment follow-ups.

RECRUITMENT MARKETING. The IIU conducted a social media mar-

keting trial aimed at understanding ‘what works’ in engaging

Canadian women with a career in the Armed Forces.

POLICY AREAS AND GUIDELINES WITHIN THE CAF. A number of policy

areas, including deployments and relocation, leave without pay,

childcare support and long-term commitments were identified

for consideration and BI-inspired improvements.

The result: The collaboration was successful and has re-

sulted in changes to the CAF’s marketing and recruitment efforts

and an increased appetite for experimentation in these areas.

Key success factors included buy-in from executives at both the

We can proactively design a ‘choice context’

to nudge users in a particular direction.