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by hiding the physical traits of auditioners behind a screen. First
adopted by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in the 1970s, this
solution benefited the individual women who received job of-
fers based on their merit — but it also rewarded orchestras by
attracting the best talent. Job-application software, like Applied
and GapJumpers, are digital versions of the same concept, hid-
ing cues like names, gender and ethnicities from evaluators,
and emphasizing candidate aptitude and task-oriented compe-
tencies that more tangibly link to prospective performance and
merit. Other efforts in this space include simplifying labels, us-
ing social-comparison framing to reduce energy consumption
and increase recycling behaviour, and using short-term incen-
tives in government-backed energy efficiency programs to boost
greener consumption.

SYSTEMIC. Systemic solutions benefit not just individuals or even

specific organizations, but overall systems. The well-known

‘opt-out’ and ‘prompted-choice’ approaches for organ donation

are two such examples, in which recognizing the power of default

options has been shown to be highly effective in increasing both

the base of potential donors and the likelihood of their organs be-

ing used, to the benefit of the entire system.

Voting is another arena in which behavioural insights have

had a significant systems-level impact. Oregon’s automatic

voter-registration system, launched in 2016, uses motor vehicle

registration information to auto-register citizens to vote. This

system has not only significantly increased the number of reg-

istered voters, it has also increased their diversity — participants

were more likely to be younger, live in lower-density areas, have

lower income and education, and represent higher racial diver-

sity — and boosted their likelihood to vote. Other recent ‘get out

the vote’ campaigns using behavioural prompts such as social

nudges and pre-commitments have been shown to help people,

especially those who live alone, establish a plan for how to get

to polling stations. Solutions like these have not only stretched

the impact of organizational budgets, but also arguably improved

systemic representativeness in the democratic process.

How to Win

Nagji and Tuff ’s ‘how to win’ is grounded in the newness of the

offerings provided by an organization. In our version, we have

substituted-in the nature and scale of behavioural interven-

tions—from adjusting current inputs and processes up to devel-

oping entirely new solutions. Let’s take a closer look at how this

works.

SHIFT INCOMING INPUTS. The examples provided above are primar-

ily instances of shifting incoming inputs, in which interventions

are aimed at influencing the range or definition of what currently

exists. This approach focuses on countering the biases that may

limit our perceptions of viable options or, in default and opt-out

situations, reducing or even eliminating the need to choose at all.

SHIFT EXISTING PROCESSES. Sometimes, targeting processes rather

than inputs is a more effective way to remove barriers to action

or reduce implicit bias. A simple yet highly effective example is

the checklist. Checklists used by John Hopkins Hospital to guide

A New Model for Integrating Behavioural

Science and Design

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HOW TO WIN

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FIGURE ONE