PopTech: What’s an analogy for being wrong?

This year’s PopTech conference focused on what we should be learning from our mistakes, our accidents and failures.

Kathryn Schulze, author of the engaging book “Being Wrong,” was an eloquent spokesperson for the virtue of humility – or “the permanent possibility of someone having a better idea.” We know what it feels like to “have been wrong,” she pointed out. But while we are “being wrong,” she notes, it doesn’t feel any different than being right. This “error blindness” is best addressed by continuing to look outside ourselves and outside are narrow specialties for signs of being wrong.

Researcher Kevin Dunbar took this “outsider” concept even further. His research showed an interesting pattern among scientific research teams that my experience suggests is applicable to the business world. It goes like this:

Groups use analogies as a tool to get things done. If you want to fix a specific problem, the best analogies to use are Local in nature.

If you want to create a new idea, your analogies need to be Regional - for example, having a physicist join a group of chemists or a sales person join a manufacturing team. These adjacent specialties help broaden the perspectives, and hence the possibilities.

If you are trying to explain a concept to a broad swath of people, Long-Distance Analogies are best. Here’s an example of a Long-Distance Analogy I use to explain where Brain Research is in the journey to curing my Parkinson’s:

Think of the electric plant that supplies the electricity to your house. Imagine being able to zone in on one electron. Right now, neuroscientists can follow that electron all the way from the plant to your town and then to your neighborhood. So if you have a brain disorder, like Parkinson’s, the doctor floods the whole neighborhood with a chemical in hopes of getting treatment to the right appliance, in the right room, in the right house in that neighborhood.

Some scientists think they are very close to being able to follow the electron all the way to the house. But until we get into the right room, there’s only so much impact we can have on diseases like Parkinson’s.

In complex times like these, we can not begin with the assumption that there is only one path or one right answer or one clear explanation. Humility about the complexity we live in and the complexity we’ve created will serve us better in the long run.