Every day, Jason Calacanis and Molly Wood cover startups, technology, markets, media, crypto, and the all the hottest topics in business and tech. They also interview the world’s greatest founders, operators, investors and innovators.
https://thisweekinstartups.com
E1077: “Alchemy” Author Rory Sutherland on the Darwinian approach to business, analyzing outliers, why eccentric CEOs have a psychological advantage with customers & more!
1:00 Jason intros "Alchemy" author Rory Sutherland
3:45 Architecture is the cheapest way to buy art
6:01 How Rory is dealing with quarantine, why he prefers working from home, and will businesses be more efficient post-COVID?
14:12 What is Rory's job, why you should strive to create your own job title, treating the free market as Galapagos Island, using the Darwinian approach to business & analyzing outliers
19:47 Why some business successes are due to psychological discoveries: Red Bull, Dyson & Nespresso
27:25 Jason's theory on why Dyson succeeded, Kano theory on product development, why eccentric CEOs have a psychological advantage with customers, how Uber's arrival map was the key feature of the product
33:48 Why the actual value of products are typically not the proposed value of products
39:40 How new products hold value as a conversation starter, how context, setting & framing is essential to innovation
43:21 Two ways to create economic value: find something people want and figure out how to make it OR figure out what you can make and make people want it & examples: Lionfish, Fish That Ate The Whale, Royal Potatoes
50:13 Why are Americans resistant to behavioral economics? Is there still a hangover from McCarthyism? How this relates to COVID and wearing masks
1:02:08 Daily news is 95% noise, why political news coverage doesn't reflect political reality
1:11:40 Why modern politics is dumb since far left and far right are much closer than they've ever been, issues with referrals & nepotism
1:21:06 How Rory got his first job in advertising "as a weirdo" and the wildcard since he was hired as part of a group, individual hiring vs. group hiring
1:23:20 TWiST Book Club Questions - Casey: Favorite behavioral study experiment or one that he found the results to be surprising? (ie. Milgram experiment or Stanford Prison Study)
1:32:12 Catherine: What’s Rory’s favorite alchemist moment of his own from work? Has he had to advocate for an illogical idea, and how did he persuade others?
1:41:01 What will we lose by being remote?
1:51:19 Reading their own audiobooks, how cheaper and easier consumption does NOT cannibalize original mediums
2:01:26 How Rory would reinvent the theatre experience, why modern corporations are slow to innovate & experiment
2:11:18 Greatness of re-readable books and rewatchable movies/television