Episode 32 with RORY SUTHERLAND: The Alchemist's Mix of Behavioral Science

Rory is the Vice Chairman of Ogilvy, and has co-founded a behavioural science practice within the agency. He works talented psychology graduates who look for ‘unseen opportunities’ in consumer behaviour - these are the very small contextual changes which can have enormous effects on the decisions people make - for instance tripling the sales rate of a call centre by adding just a few sentences to the script. Before this, Rory was a copywriter and creative director at Ogilvy for over 20 years. Before his life-changing (for many of his fans) career at Ogilvy, Rory has been President of the IPA, Chair of the Judges for the Direct Jury at Cannes, and has spoken at TED Global. He is also an author. having written: 'The Wiki Man', and the newly published 'Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense.'

Important links

• Say hi 👋 to Rory:

  Twitter | LinkedIn | Ogilvy

• Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don’t Make Sense

• Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life

• Economics and evolutionary psychology

• The Case Against Reality: Why Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes

• The history of how Uber went from the most feared startup in the world to its massive IPO

• Ergodic process

• Heterodox Academy

• Reciprocal altruism

• Psychology is WEIRD

• Student’s t-distribution

• 800 scientists say it’s time to abandon “statistical significance”

• Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence

• Bayesian statistics

• Removing the hassle factor associated with loft insulation: Results of a behavioural trial

• Fast Versus Slow Life Strategy

• Dunbar’s Number: Why We Can Only Maintain 150 Relationships