Identifying the Unique Value Adds of Applied Behavioral Science

In recent years, behavioral science has been gaining traction within organizations, and in some instances, it has even evolved into its own department. However, as the field matures, it is becoming more common to view behavioral science as an upskilling opportunity for other departments, such as design, marketing, and product, rather than as an isolated discipline. In this view, a small behavioral science team takes on a few projects and trains its stakeholders to incorporate behavioral insights into their work.?

As the field continues to grow, it is critical to identify the areas where applied behavioral science offers unique value additions. In my work and through a review of some of the most popular books on applied behavioral science, such as?Behavioral Science in the Wild?and?Building Behavioral Science in Organizations, I believe there are four areas where behavioral science offers a new lens: Deeply understanding context, development, and fine-tuning of interventions; measurement of outcomes; and establishing a vision. In addition to these value areas, applying behavioral science requires a solid system for tracking problems and a means to test out and scale solutions. While it is not unique to the field, behavioral scientists should be pivotal collaborators in these two additional areas.?

Four primary value additions

Understanding Context

The importance of context when developing a solution for a user problem cannot be overstated. Behavioral science sheds light on the intricacies of human behavior and how people make choices in different contexts. Organizations can develop more targeted and practical strategies to engage with their audience by understanding the various factors influencing decision-making. This includes factors such as social norms, cognitive biases, emotions, and environmental cues, all of which can significantly impact individuals' choices.

For instance, a company looking to promote sustainable consumer behavior might investigate the contextual factors that drive eco-friendly choices. Behavioral science can help identify the barriers and motivators for making environmentally responsible decisions, allowing the company to tailor their messaging and offerings to address these factors. By tapping into the power of context, organizations can create more meaningful connections with their audience and drive positive change.

Fine-tuning intervention development

Developing interventions that effectively address the needs and motivations of the target audience is crucial for achieving desired outcomes. After identifying the context, other disciplines can use their methodologies to identify potential solutions; for example, UX might approach it with Design Thinking. A behavioral scientist might then jump in to determine how they can tweak proposed changes to the environment to maximize the ideal outcome. Here they can draw on the academic knowledge of social norms, biases and heuristics, and habit formation; among others, to enhance the intervention development process, making it more efficient and impactful.

Behavioral insights can help organizations identify the most relevant factors affecting their target audience's decision-making processes. The behavioral scientist can use this information to design interventions targeting these factors, increasing the likelihood of success. For example, a health organization aiming to increase vaccination rates could utilize behavioral science to understand the reasons for vaccine hesitancy and create tailored messaging to be included in any new feature or marketing designs to address these concerns.

Measurement

Effectively measuring the outcomes of interventions and strategies is critical for understanding their impact and guiding future decision-making. Behavioral science can significantly contribute to this process by providing organizations with the tools and methodologies necessary to evaluate their efforts' success accurately. Beginning the measurement process, a behavioral scientist can help organizations identify the most relevant metrics for assessing the outcomes of their interventions. The specific value here is moving beyond surface-level metrics commonly collected, such as usage and satisfaction, to understand the change in decisions that the end users made and the impact on their lives.?

By focusing on key performance indicators (KPIs) that directly relate to the behavioral changes they aim to achieve, organizations can more accurately evaluate the effectiveness of their strategies. For example, an organization promoting energy conservation might measure success by reducing energy consumption among its target audience rather than relying on less-direct indicators like website visits or social media engagement. Furthermore, the team could survey or interview these customers to better understand how their behaviors have changed and their secondary effects on their daily lives.?

Adding to a greater vision

Behavioral science provides valuable insights for addressing immediate challenges and contributes to an organization's broader strategic vision. By integrating behavioral insights into long-term planning, organizations can develop a more comprehensive and cohesive strategy around the future behaviors they desire their users are exhibiting. Moving beyond thinking about a consumer using their product or service, they can envision a user being healthier, happier, or more educated. With a primary behavior change at its core, a strategy will then have specific components on how to convert a user to take that action more often can be built into a product roadmap.?

For example, a financial institution might incorporate behavioral insights into its overall strategy for promoting financial wellness among its customers. By understanding the factors that drive financial decision-making, the institution can develop more effective educational programs, product offerings, and communication strategies that cater to the needs and preferences of its customers. In this way, behavioral science can inform and enhance the overall strategic vision of an organization, leading to long-lasting positive impacts.

Incorporating behavioral science into an organization's broader vision fosters a culture of evidence-based decision-making and continuous learning. As organizations integrate behavioral insights into their long-term planning, they become more adept at using data and experimentation to drive their strategies, ultimately leading to more effective and informed decision-making.

Deep Collaborations

Beyond the four value adds above, applied behavioral scientists can provide exceptional value by becoming a core player in two other areas that are generally owned by more established teams: the first is the definition of customer problems managed by Marketing, Product, and User Experience, the second is the testing and scaling of features which is commonly owned by engineering, product, and data science. While behavioral scientists would not be the primary stakeholder for these, their knowledge and skills can provide tremendous additional value.?

Building out problem definitions

Accurately defining the user problems an organization aims to address is a crucial first step in developing effective solutions. Behavioral science can support this process by providing insights into the underlying motivations, biases, and decision-making processes that drive the target audience's behavior. This understanding helps organizations better define their problems and develop more targeted, contextually relevant strategies.

For example, a company aiming to reduce workplace stress might initially identify the problem as a lack of employee well-being resources. However, behavioral science can help uncover deeper issues, such as employees' reluctance to seek help due to social stigma or the inability to recognize signs of stress. By understanding these underlying factors, the organization can develop more comprehensive solutions that address the root causes of the problem rather than merely addressing surface-level symptoms.

Testing and scaling solutions

Testing and scaling solutions are vital steps in creating successful interventions. Behavioral science encourages organizations to adopt a data-driven approach by conducting experiments, gathering data, and analyzing results to determine the efficacy of their solutions. This process allows organizations to learn from their experiences, optimize their resources, and iterate on their interventions, ensuring that they allocate resources toward strategies with a proven impact.

For example, an organization aiming to improve employee productivity might test various strategies, such as offering flexible work hours or providing training on time management skills. By conducting controlled experiments and analyzing the resulting data, the organization can identify which strategies impact productivity most and refine its approach accordingly.

Once successful interventions have been identified, scaling these solutions for broader applications is crucial. Behavioral science can inform the scaling process by guiding adapting interventions to different contexts and populations and identifying potential barriers and facilitators to scaling. By leveraging these insights, organizations can more effectively expand the reach and impact of their successful interventions, ensuring that the benefits of these strategies are maximized across the organization.

Common challenges

While behavioral scientists can create value in many places, the path to success is not easy, and as the tech market has suffered, so have many of the leading tech behavioral science teams.?

Overcoming resistance to change

Integrating behavioral science into an organization's culture can be met with resistance. To overcome this obstacle, it is essential to demonstrate the value of behavioral insights and encourage a mindset of continuous learning and experimentation. A behavioral scientist can achieve this by showcasing successful case studies, providing training and resources, and fostering open communication about the benefits of incorporating behavioral science. By cultivating a culture that embraces change and innovation, organizations can more effectively harness the potential of behavioral science to drive positive outcomes.

Encouraging interdisciplinary collaboration

The success of integrating behavioral science often hinges on interdisciplinary collaboration. Fostering a culture of cross-departmental cooperation can lead to innovative solutions that take advantage of the unique insights provided by behavioral science. To encourage collaboration, organizations can facilitate regular cross-functional meetings, provide opportunities for joint projects, and promote open communication channels between departments. Organizations can more effectively integrate behavioral science into their operations and decision-making processes by creating an environment that values diverse perspectives.

Making themselves redundant through upskilling others

One challenge behavioral scientists face within organizations is the potential for making themselves redundant by upskilling others. By teaching colleagues about behavioral insights and techniques, behavioral scientists might inadvertently create a scenario in which their specialized expertise is no longer required. However, this challenge can also be viewed as an opportunity for growth and evolution. Organizations can empower others with behavioral science knowledge to create a culture where evidence-based decision-making and behavioral insights are ingrained in everyday operations. This can lead to more sustainable and long-lasting positive change across the organization.

Ethical decisions when changing behavior for profit

Integrating behavioral science into an organization's strategies can raise ethical questions, particularly when changing consumer behavior for profit. Organizations must balance leveraging behavioral insights to achieve business objectives and respecting the autonomy and well-being of their customers. To navigate these ethical challenges, organizations can establish clear guidelines and principles that prioritize the welfare of their customers and ensure transparency in their decision-making processes. By maintaining an ethical framework that values consumer trust and well-being, organizations can responsibly harness the power of behavioral science to create value for their customers and their business.

Developing a culture of experimentation and learning

Organizations that embrace a culture of experimentation and learning can reap the full benefits of behavioral science. This approach fosters an environment where new ideas are tested, refined, and scaled, ensuring that the organization remains agile and adaptive. To create a culture of experimentation and learning, organizations can promote a growth mindset, provide resources and support for the investigation, and celebrate successes and failures as opportunities for learning. By embracing this mindset, organizations can more effectively integrate behavioral science into their operations and drive continuous improvement and innovation.

Looking Forward

In conclusion, integrating behavioral science into organizational practices offers immense potential to drive positive outcomes, enhance decision-making processes, and foster innovation. By understanding the unique value of behavioral science, organizations can leverage its insights to understand context better, fine-tune interventions, and contribute to a more significant strategic vision. Furthermore, the application of behavioral science can assist organizations in building out problem definitions, testing, and scaling solutions, and navigating challenges related to change, collaboration, upskilling, and ethical considerations.

To fully realize the benefits of behavioral science, organizations must embrace a culture of experimentation, learning, and interdisciplinary collaboration. Doing so can create an environment where evidence-based decision-making and behavioral insights are ingrained in everyday operations, leading to more sustainable and long-lasting positive change across the organization. Ultimately, integrating behavioral science can empower organizations to create more effective, targeted, and impactful strategies that drive success and contribute to the well-being of their customers, employees, and stakeholders.

**Note, I wrote this article in a 2-hour window to test what is possible with GPT and Grammarly. I started with the highlights below and had it build an outline and then paragraphs for each entry. From there, I tweaked them to add in my voice and then used Grammarly to rewrite it for clarity and grammatical correctness.?

Main Highlights:

• In few cases behavioral science has created enough of a presence to be considered its own department
• Instead, it is generally better to view it as an upskilling of other groups such as design, marketing, and product
• Rather than looking at all that the field has to offer, another lens is to view the specific unique value adds
• Specific value adds: Understanding context; Fine-tuning intervention development; and Adding to a greater vision
• Beyond these unique value ads, applied Behavioral Science can also assist with better building out problem definitions; testing Solutions; and scaling