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Pain Points – Addressing Your Big Problems the Behavioral Design Way

By Cynthia G. Parshall and David Cox

What are the biggest pain points that you have to deal with, at your credentialing program?

For many credentialing organizations, the answer to that question revolves around the all too human behaviors of their program stakeholders. The behavioral responses or decisions made in the context of being a candidate, credential holder, or even a volunteer subject matter expert (SME) are among the most perplexing areas of functional harmony – our pain points.

For credentialing candidates, a pain point theme we have been hearing about is loss of initiative. We hear about candidates who start the process of earning a credential but fail to complete the necessary steps. These failures may occur at any point in the credentialing process, from initial application through assessment.  For example, we’ve heard that many credentialing organizations are confounded by test-takers who fail the exam on their first attempt, but then do not try to retest. For programs with associated self-paced online learning, we hear about students who seem eager to complete the credential, but then abandon their studies midway. Credential sponsors are often mystified when they attempt to reconcile a candidate’s motivation to enroll, with their lack of completion.

Programs that rely heavily on volunteer SMEs in test development activities or program governance, identify pain point challenges in SME engagement. These programs struggle with understanding why SMEs aren’t more eager to participate in the community of practice associated with their credential, even though they would gain valuable social capital in the process.

Other program sponsor pain points are associated with compliance. In these instances, the challenges relate to certificate holders who resist adherence to codes of conduct, continuing education, recertification deadlines, or even test security non-disclosures.

All of these human behaviors show a disconnect between an individual’s values and outcomes. These disconnections, between intentions and actions, between what we say and what we do, are quite common human behaviors. Since we know that none of us is fully rational, how can we use that understanding to address these intention-action gaps? Behavioral design may have the answer.

According to advocates of the burgeoning field of behavioral economics – as humans we are subject to fundamental cognitive biases that interfere with our ability to act in ways that rationally maximize our own welfare or improve social outcomes. These types of biases can hinder us from making good decisions about saving for retirement, eating healthily, driving safely, or even complying with the law. However, once we recognize the problem accurately, we can design solutions to address it.

Behavioral Design and the Use of Nudges

The behavioral design (also known as Action Design) approach to addressing these “human nature” pain points involves the use of nudges. The term “nudge” comes from a bestseller of the same name and it refers to subtle changes in the context that encourage people to change their behavior. These small changes can make a big difference in helping to reduce the intention-action gap.

Effective nudges are based in research from the behavioral sciences, especially from behavioral economics, psychology, and usability. This research has produced an extensive knowledge base about where people have predictable cognitive biases, as well as the contextual factors that influence a person’s decision-making processes. Well-designed nudges, using this research base, can help our stakeholders make good choices. “By knowing how people think, we can make it easier for them to choose what is best for them, their families, and society.” (Thaler & Sunstein, 2008). A substantial record of research provides good evidence that behaviorally designed nudges can be both effective and cost-effective.

While nudges have been applied in a wide range of contexts, from health to finances to education, they are particularly useful anywhere we rely on compliance. For example,  government policy interventions  that have historically relied on compliance to enforce tax collection, recycling, or public safety, might use a behavioral design approach to implement a simple nudge instead of legislating behavior. This approach is so useful that over 60 governmental “nudge units” have been established around the world, beginning most famously with the Behavioral Insights Team within 10 Downing Street, London.

Concerns About Nudges

The power of nudges makes it all the more important for designers to be cautious when they apply behavior insights. We must take care that we implement a nudge, not a shove. There may be a behavior we want to encourage, but the goal is not to manipulate our stakeholders with behavioral tricks. Instead, true, ethical, nudges are characterized by the principle of least coercion. Nudges should be open and transparent, and the individual should always retain freedom of choice in his or her decision making. For example, we may change a default option, which has the power to increase the number of people who “select” that choice. But we still make that choice visible and easily changed; this preserves freedom of choice. Classic application of these principles in designing nudges include the default settings on smart phones, automatic enrollment in retirement plans, and nutrition labeling on foods.

The Need for Research When Applying Nudges

An important part of applying behavioral design is to start with research. While nudges and other behavioral tools are undoubtedly effective, they don’t work like a magic pill. When nudges are applied without research, they may be ineffective, or in some unfortunate cases even counter-productive.

A crucial aspect of this research is to conduct a behavioral audit. This is a detailed analysis of every step that the user needs to take, to complete the desired behavior. The behavioral audit is likely to uncover numerous points of friction in the user’s journey. Since many studies show that a single point of friction can be enough to stop someone from following through on a goal – and most of our processes have many points of friction – addressing these bumps in the road can result in a powerful impact.

(More about the behavioral design research process can be found here.)

Your Ideas About Pain Points

Nudges are being used to solve intractable problems – pain points – across industries and across the globe. The credentialing field has some pervasive and expensive problems, and behavioral design could offer a solution.

What do you think might be pain points within credentialing that could be addressed with understanding the behavioral insights we’ve discussed here? Please give us some ideas in the Leave a Reply field below!

Additional posts

For more information on similar topics go to Behavioral Design.

References

Go to Additional Resources for Action Design for references.

Categorized in: Industry News