February 23, 2025 • 28 mins
Mental models are key to thinking and acting skillfully. But the phrase "mental models" itself has several meanings. In this conversation, we explore models of mental models – and land on one with practical implications for your life.
- The Power of Impossible Thinking by Yoram (Jerry) Wind, Colin Crook and Robert Gunther
- Indi Young
- The Informed Life ep. 82: Indi Young on Time to Listen
- Mental Models by Indi Young
- Farnam Street
- The Great Mental Models Series by Shane Parrish
- Mistakes Were Made (but Not By Me) by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson
- Charlie Munger
- Immunity to Change by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey
- Diagnosing Your Own Immunity to Change by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey (pdf)
- Minds At Work
- Liminal Thinking by Dave Gray
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Harry (00:00):
The mental model is a construct, in effect, of
(00:04):
assumptions, which areuncritically held beliefs that
are supported by hiddenunconscious commitments that you
have, and then how you manifestthose as behavior or lack of
behavior.
Narrator (00:24):
You're listening to Traction Heroes.
Digging In to Get Results withHarry Max and Jorge Arango.
Jorge (00:34):
Harry, it's good to see you.
Harry (00:35):
Ah, it's great to see you again, Jorge.
Jorge (00:38):
Feels like it's been a while since we last talked.
How are things going for you?
Harry (00:43):
Things are good.
I mean, we've come off all thefires all over California and
that's been interesting to saythe least.
And here we are, sliding intothe new year with a new form of
government, I think.
(01:03):
Not quite sure what's going onthere, but trying to keep an
open mind, stay curious.
Jorge (01:09):
We had a conversation about dealing with the
unprecedented, right?
And as I've been watching thenews, that conversation has been
echoing in my ears.
So much of what we've talkedabout feels to me is about
gaining greater...
(01:30):
I was gonna use the phraseself-awareness.
Harry (01:32):
Mm-hmm
Jorge (01:33):
So that you can have greater agency.
The one thing one can't do ispanic and become paralyzed or
hysterical or something.
And then, you can't actskillfully.
Harry (01:44):
Yeah.
Staying present is definitelythe challenge and whether you're
at home or whether you'reworking with your team or
whether you're in some largerorganizational context, staying
present and open open-hearted,open-minded and looking at the
facts as they are not, as they"should be."
Jorge (02:07):
Or appear to be, right?
Harry (02:09):
Right.
Yeah.
These are the challenges inthese days.
Jorge (02:12):
Yeah, how do we see clearly?
That feels to me like a goodsegue.
I have something I wanna read toyou.
I actually have a physical bookhere, which is unusual for me
these days.
But I will read from this thing.
Harry (02:27):
Okay, go for it.
Jorge (02:29):
"It's midnight, and you hear a loud radio in the
apartment downstairs.
Last week, the quiet old man wholived there passed away and
you've been concerned about thearrival of the next tenant.
You never know who might movein, and you've heard some real
horror stories from your collegefriends.
In an apartment house, the wrongneighbors can make your life
(02:52):
miserable.
"Now, your worst fears have cometrue.
The rock music plays on and on.
You toss and turn looking at theclock, it's 12:30 AM You decide
to wait just a little longer.
Even if your new neighbor is ajerk, you are reluctant to turn
your first meeting into a fight.
(03:14):
At 1:00 AM, the radio isblasting just as loud.
What kind of party are theythrowing down there?
You've got to get up for worktomorrow.
How can a person be so ignorant?
So you walk down to lecture thisidiot to common courtesy.
You knock heavily on the doorand it swings open.
(03:36):
"You are surprised to find theapartment completely bare.
There is no sign of your newneighbor.
There isn't even a sign offurniture.
So you walk in.
In the back room, you find somedrop cloths and paint cans.
Plugged into one wall, you see aboombox cranked up full.
(03:58):
"There is no neighbor, just acareless painter who left the
radio on when he left for theday.
The new tenant hasn't evenarrived yet.
The ignorant neighbor that youyou invented based on the noise
vanishes into air, but the angerand other emotions you felt are
still very real.
"You have trouble settling downand going back to sleep because
(04:20):
you're still angry at thisneighbor.
A neighbor who exists only inyour mind.
You created this evil figure toexplain the loud music, and he
took on a life of his own.
If you hadn't gone down andknocked on the door, you might
have lived with this illusionfor days.
(04:41):
"Your mental models shape theway you see the world.
They help you to quickly makesense of the noises that filter
in from outside, but they canalso limit your ability to see
the true picture.
They are with you always andlike your neighbors can be a
great help or can keep you up atnight without reason."
Harry (05:04):
Wow.
Man, so many things popped intomy head.
I don't know the work.
What is the book?
Jorge (05:14):
This is a book called The Power of Impossible Thinking and
the subtitle is Transform theBusiness of Your Life and the
Life of Your Business.
And it's by Yoram I hope Ipronounce that right Jerry Wind
and Colin Crook with RobertGunther.
And this is a book published byWharton.
(05:37):
It's a book about mental models,basically.
And that's what I was hoping wewould talk about today, because
mental models is one of thoseideas that is central to the
work of design and those of uswho do this kind of work develop
(06:00):
means to try to understandpeople's mental models and to
influence people's mentalmodels.
And it feels like one of thosedesign superpowers that maybe
other folks would benefit fromunderstanding and practicing.
Harry (06:16):
Wow.
I'm just writing a couple thingsdown here.
Have you ever done any work withIndi Young?
Jorge (06:24):
I've interviewed Indi for my previous podcast.
I haven't worked with herdirectly, but I admire her work.
And she did write a book calledMental Models, right?
Harry (06:32):
Yeah.
the reason a fourth[inaudble]things just jumped into my head
all at once.
And like one of those pens withfour colors, that you get to
select one color at a time.
Like, I kept in my brain, kepttrying to push them all up at
the same time and it all juststopped.
But the one that managed to getto the top was when I was at
Rackspace.
So I was the, the VP ofexperience design at Rackspace
(06:56):
when we were building the opencloud.
Hired Indi to come in, help usbuild out a mental model because
we had a fairly complicated andcomplex challenge that we needed
to get out of one mental frameand into another.
And my first experience movingfrom the concept and idea of a
(07:22):
mental model to the practice andthe map of a mental model was
working with Indi and it wasreally illuminating.
Anyway, Indy came in and helpedmy team build out a very
sophisticated mental model forhow to think about cloud
computing from the point of viewof a business user.
(07:43):
And it was really the first timethat I had a structure for how
to think about a mental model.
And that was the kind of thefirst thing that managed to pop
up through the pen into the tipwas, model as a concept before
working with Indi just likethese two words that were
(08:03):
very...
not ephemeral, but veryabstract.
And, then working with her, itturned into a very concrete way
of thinking about who isinvolved in something and what
do they want and need in thatcontext, and what would they go
(08:28):
about doing to achieve what theywant and need in that context,
which is interestingly, verysimilar to prioritization.
So that was the, very firstthought of going from this
abstract idea of what mentalmodels are to my first, I think,
concrete experience in having anoutput, a big map, right?
(08:50):
It was, I don't know, probablyeight feet long and four feet
tall of printer paper posted onthe inside of a wall at
Rackspace, where we could allsee what people...
what we hallucinated they wantedto do, and what the research
about who these users were, thecharacteristics and attributes
(09:13):
of their persona, what the taskswere that they were trying to
accomplish, and so on and soforth.
Anyway, that was the first thingthat jumped to mind.
Jorge (09:22):
One of Indi's many contributions to the field of
interaction design, userexperience design more broadly,
is turning this kind of somewhatvague idea about mental models
into an artifact that, to yourpoint, that people can point at
(09:43):
and discuss and see where thingscome from.
It's been many years since Iread that book, but as I recall,
the charismatic table that oftengets shown in slides and stuff
has to do with someone doingtheir morning routine if I'm not
mistaken, right?
They get up and then they dotheir morning toilet, and then
(10:06):
they do their breakfast.
And you can map out the thingsthey're doing and you could
investigate what they'rethinking as they're going about
doing that, right?
And then from that you mightstart making some assumptions
about how that person thinks ofthat particular situation and
the things they can and cannotdo there.
Harry (10:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
Another place it jumped was,I've been following Farnam
Street and Shane Parrish's workfor a long time I don't think it
was a month ago that I actuallygot my four-book set.
The different colors, his bookset called Mental Models, right?
(10:48):
It's all the differentframeworks and approaches for
thinking about thinking, AKAmental models.
And I'm, so excited to at somepoint crack open.
I think it's volume one, the redversion,,and start digging into
that to look at it from adifferent point of view.
(11:12):
Like, rather than looking at itthrough the lens of personas and
what they're trying toaccomplish and what the tasks
are and how they approach thingsand perhaps what assumptions
they're making and in this moreformalistic approach to mental
modeling.
I'm super excited about diggingin, going in from the bottom up
(11:36):
as it were, and maybe lookingthrough the lens of primitives,
if you will, the pieces ofmental models or possibly the
contributing components inmental models in hopes of trying
to build, not just this top downway I have of thinking about it
now, largely from Indi, but amore bottoms up oriented version
(12:01):
that might be able to exploitmany of the tools that I've
developed and you and I'm sureuse in our practice.
The other thing I thought ofwhile you were talking was, I
remember I took a class incollege, it was a social
psychology class with ElliotAronson.
(12:25):
He co-authored a book with awoman named Caroll Tavris called
Mistakes Were Made, But Not ByMe, which is for a long time one
of my favorite books.
And it was really looking atkind of the mechanics of
self-deception and how to thinkabout the role of cognitive
(12:45):
dissonance in how we perhapsmove through the world in a way
that is arguably easier so longas the way that we're moving
through the world is alignedwith who we think we are.
And when we start running intofriction with how we think or
(13:08):
how we're behaving because it'sin conflict with who we think we
are, even at a very unconsciouslevel, that creates this
dissonance.
And the book really outlinesthis fantastic way of thinking
about how we go about doingthings that seemingly are so
incongruent to how we wouldotherwise think of ourselves and
(13:29):
what we're approaching.
Jorge (13:30):
I, wanna circle back to that, but, but I want to take a
step back here, because I wasactually very glad that you
brought up Shane Parish's work.
I do not have the physicalbooks, I did buy the ebooks.
Again, But the reason I'm gladyou brought that up is because I
suspect that most people whohave heard the phrase mental
(13:51):
models today have heard itthrough Shane's work.
Harry (13:55):
Uh.
Jorge (13:56):
He's certainly the person who I think of as writing the
most about this more recently.
And I think that his usage isdifferent from Indi's.
He uses it in the sense ofCharlie Munger.
But I think that Indi's usage ofmental models, it's about how a
(14:17):
particular person, anindividual, sees a particular
part of their world.
Like I said, how do you thinkabout the beginning of your day,
right?
Like you're making breakfast andstuff like that.
And there's certain things thatyou do and certain things that
you expect to be there.
And as a designer, you try tounderstand the mental models
that people have about thedomain that you are designing
(14:39):
for.
I did a project where we weredesigning a system that was
meant to be used byneurosurgeons to diagnose
traumatic brain injuries.
The users of such a system bringa very particular mindset, and
you have to understand how thosefolks see the world to be able
to design that system.
(14:59):
That is one usage of mentalmodel.
And that's what I think of asthe traditional design usage of
mental models.
I think that the CharlieMunger/Shane Parrish usage
conceives of mental models asthinking tools.
So a mental model is some kindof shortcut that you have in
(15:21):
your mind to help you thinkabout something, right?
Harry (15:24):
Yeah, that's why I was calling them primitives.
I was trying to get at that sameidea, but maybe use the wrong
word.
Jorge (15:30):
right.
Well, but I think it's importantto call out because if you heard
the phrase"mental models"through Shane's work, and then
we're talking about the stuffthat Indi does, it might not be
connecting, because they arevery different things.
And it might be that the personwho's making their breakfast
does have mental models of thesort that Shane writes about.
(15:50):
But there are different focuses.
Now, to circle back to what youwere saying just before I
interrupted you, what I washearing there is that it would
be helpful for somebody to havegood models of their own mental
models.
Harry (16:11):
And that's especially true...
like, in the work that we didwith Indi, it wasn't so much
about the mental model of thepeople doing the work, it was
the people, myself included, whowere trying to design a
solution, needed to understandthe breadth of how all these
(16:35):
smaller mental models would fittogether.
The beginning of the day examplewas like one category in this
broad model.
And the thing is, in order todesign the entire experience we
needed to have not just themorning, but we needed to have
(16:57):
the day, and not just the day,but we needed to have the week
and we needed to have it frommultiple stakeholders.
We needed to be able to come atit from multiple points of view.
And so it was in effect a metamental model.
And a piece of it might havebeen the kind of mental model
that you were describing.
(17:18):
But the whole mental model thatwe built was really a meta
version of that.
And so, when I think aboutIndi's work, I think about
mental modeling more than Ithink about a mental model.
Jorge (17:31):
One way that I've put that in the past is that the
"deliverable" the diagram thatcomes out the other end might be
of use in that it helpsdesigners structure the product
or whatever.
(17:51):
But it's the process at arrivingat that diagram that has real
value.
The questions that you have toask, the research that you have
to do, it will in some waysforce you to confront aspects of
the context and perhaps thething that you're making to fit
(18:15):
into that context that you wouldnot have encountered otherwise.
Harry (18:21):
Yeah.
And as I was reflecting on this,it occurred to me that in the
executive coaching/psychologicaldomain, there is a similar
approach.
It's called the Immunity toChange model by Leahy and Kegan,
I think it is.
(18:41):
The Immunity to Change model andthere is a book on the subject
really looks at the types ofassumptions that underpin the
behaviors that you're eitherdemonstrating or not
demonstrating, that arepreventing you from getting
closer to what you want, suchthat you can challenge those
(19:04):
assumptions as uncritically heldbeliefs to determine to what
extent those assumptions are orare not true, which allows you
then to build a plan to getdifferent results.
And so, I had never made thatconnection before, but Immunity
to Change as a model is a mentalmodeling activity.
(19:29):
And it's very powerful forworking with people one-on-one.
And I suppose it could beapplied at an organizational or
a team level to generate changeas well.
Jorge (19:41):
Have you seen an example that might illustrate how that
approach works?
Harry (19:47):
I've used it in my work fairly extensively, but only at
the individual level.
So the Immunity to Change modelis a mental modeling tool, and
it is a very simple, yetincredibly powerful mechanism
for identifying the things thatwe're...
(20:11):
The Immunity to Change people,their business is called Minds
At Work, but the Immunity toChange people refer to those as
hidden commitments.
So these are things that you'recommitted to doing because it's
how you go about getting theresults that you're getting
today, even if those are at oddswith the results that you would
(20:32):
like to have in the future.
So the Immunity Map, which isthe one of the two central tools
that Immunity to Change presentsis a four column model that
starts with column one, it'syour commitment.
It's the thing that you reallywant to change.
It's really the one thing thatyou are really motivated to
(20:53):
change.
It is not for the, faint ofheart, right?
Column two is, what are youdoing or not doing today?
So this is your as-is state andthe things that you're doing
today might or might not behelping you achieve your goal
(21:17):
and the things you're not doingtoday might or might not be
helping you to achieve yourgoal, but the aggregate set of
things that you're doing and notdoing are not pushing you
forward fast enough to get thegoal that you're highly
motivated to get.
The third column is what theycharacterize as these hidden
(21:38):
commitments.
And these are the things thatyou're committed to pursuing
because this is the structure ofthe...
it's the glue of your mentalmodel, in a sense, right?
I have this goal, but I'm doingor not doing these things.
(21:59):
And when I look at why I'm doingthese things, I can tell you I
have a hidden commitment topursuing these things I'm doing
because of these beliefs I have.
And then the fourth column iswhat are the big assumptions
that sit underneath that.
I have an example here.
So commitment.
So I wanna, here's a, here's anexample of an improvement goal.
(22:23):
I wanna secure meaningful workthat allows me to provide for my
family.
Right now, this is a client Iwas working with who, a very
senior level person who wassuccessfully working in an arena
where they didn't feel it wasmeaningful and finding work that
(22:43):
paid enough was, in their mind,in conflict with meaningful
work.
So their commitment, theirimprovement goal was to secure
meaningful work that allows themto provide for their family.
And in the column two, what arethey doing or not doing?
So an example is, I'm trying toprove myself to people who hold
(23:08):
power.
So I want to be validated bythem.
Just happens to be a thing thatthis person's doing.
He's kissing up in a sense,right?
And here's a thing that he's notdoing: he's not calling people
from his past professionally, sohe's not mining his network.
And it turns out in this case,because he doesn't have a story
(23:29):
that he feels comfortable with.
And so, if you look at thehidden commitments, one of them
is he worries that he'd haveanother negative work
experience.
He's worried that if he goes andtakes another job, it's gonna be
another place where he gets paidwell, but it's soul sucking.
(23:50):
And so, the way that theImmunity to Change people look
at this is a hidden commitmentis, he's committed to having
negative work experiences in hiscurrent model, right?
He's demonstrating that.
He's had two jobs in a row, twosenior level jobs, where he has
(24:11):
gotten the job, and it payswell, but it's a negative
experience because it's notmeaningful.
He's committed to that.
But it's an unconsciouscommitment.
And in this particular case, Ididn't pull up a more complete
version of the map, but anassumption underneath that might
(24:33):
have been that findingmeaningful work that pays enough
is not possible.
That might be an assumption.
And so the Immunity to Changemodel says,"Okay, your job here
is to test that assumption." Butin order to test that
(24:56):
assumption, you have to knowwhat that assumption is.
In order to identify thatassumption, you have to
understand what you're committedto unconsciously, right?
In order to understand what yourunconscious commitments are, you
have to look at what you'redoing and not doing because that
demonstrates the activity thatsupports the hidden commitment,
(25:17):
that essentially confirms theassumption and it is
inconsistent with the goal.
So the only way to get out ofthis loop is to test the
assumptions and find out thatthey are, in fact, either not
true or they are true, whichwhatever happens to be the case
(25:37):
for you.
Or to what degree are theyeither true or not true such
that you might be able tochallenge them at the level of
your mental model.
So the mental model is aconstruct, in effect, of
assumptions, which areuncritically held beliefs that
are supported by hiddenunconscious commitments that you
(26:01):
have, and then how you manifestthose as behavior or lack of
behavior.
And that's this other way ofthinking about a mental model as
well.
It's super powerful forgenerating change.
Jorge (26:16):
It sounds like a tool to make the invisible visible in
service to coherence.
You have the stated goals, butthen you also...
it's like,"I wanna lose weight,but I also love ice cream,"
right?
And those two things are inconflict.
(26:37):
And as you were describing itreminded me, our common friend
Dave Gray, wrote a book calledLiminal Thinking that has a,
similar framework, right?
I forget exactly what Dave'sframework is, but I remember it
having the things that you dobeing influenced by the things
that you think being influencedby the things you believe, and
(26:59):
there's these very deep layers.
And it behooves you it behoovesus to try to bring them out to
the fore where you can admitthat you do have a conflict
there, which is keeping you fromgaining traction.
Harry (27:16):
That's exactly right.
That's a hundred percent right.
Oh, I love that.
because this is the entirepoint.
And the entire point is if youcan surface this stuff from the
unconscious to the conscious andyou can connect it with tools to
make it possible to get from acurrent as-is state to a future
(27:38):
to-be state, that's how you gettraction.
And then, you can move fromgetting traction to getting
momentum.
And from momentum to gettingvelocity.
And then you're really moving,or cooking with gas as they say.
Jorge (27:56):
We're not gonna be able to top that.
Let's, let's wrap it there.
as always, I learned so muchfrom our conversations.
That feels like a really usefulmodel to look into.
Thank you so much.
Harry (28:08):
Wow.
That was a good one.
Thank you so much.
Yeah.
Narrator (28:17):
Thank you for listening to Traction Heroes
with Harry Max and Jorge Arango.
Check out the shownotes@tractionheroes.com and if
you enjoyed the show, pleaseleave us a rating in Apple's
podcasts app.
Thanks.
The mental model is a construct, in effect, of
(00:04):
assumptions, which areuncritically held beliefs that
are supported by hiddenunconscious commitments that you
have, and then how you manifestthose as behavior or lack of
behavior.
Narrator (00:24):
You're listening to Traction Heroes.
Digging In to Get Results withHarry Max and Jorge Arango.
Jorge (00:34):
Harry, it's good to see you.
Harry (00:35):
Ah, it's great to see you again, Jorge.
Jorge (00:38):
Feels like it's been a while since we last talked.
How are things going for you?
Harry (00:43):
Things are good.
I mean, we've come off all thefires all over California and
that's been interesting to saythe least.
And here we are, sliding intothe new year with a new form of
government, I think.
(01:03):
Not quite sure what's going onthere, but trying to keep an
open mind, stay curious.
Jorge (01:09):
We had a conversation about dealing with the
unprecedented, right?
And as I've been watching thenews, that conversation has been
echoing in my ears.
So much of what we've talkedabout feels to me is about
gaining greater...
(01:30):
I was gonna use the phraseself-awareness.
Harry (01:32):
Mm-hmm
Jorge (01:33):
So that you can have greater agency.
The one thing one can't do ispanic and become paralyzed or
hysterical or something.
And then, you can't actskillfully.
Harry (01:44):
Yeah.
Staying present is definitelythe challenge and whether you're
at home or whether you'reworking with your team or
whether you're in some largerorganizational context, staying
present and open open-hearted,open-minded and looking at the
facts as they are not, as they"should be."
Jorge (02:07):
Or appear to be, right?
Harry (02:09):
Right.
Yeah.
These are the challenges inthese days.
Jorge (02:12):
Yeah, how do we see clearly?
That feels to me like a goodsegue.
I have something I wanna read toyou.
I actually have a physical bookhere, which is unusual for me
these days.
But I will read from this thing.
Harry (02:27):
Okay, go for it.
Jorge (02:29):
"It's midnight, and you hear a loud radio in the
apartment downstairs.
Last week, the quiet old man wholived there passed away and
you've been concerned about thearrival of the next tenant.
You never know who might movein, and you've heard some real
horror stories from your collegefriends.
In an apartment house, the wrongneighbors can make your life
(02:52):
miserable.
"Now, your worst fears have cometrue.
The rock music plays on and on.
You toss and turn looking at theclock, it's 12:30 AM You decide
to wait just a little longer.
Even if your new neighbor is ajerk, you are reluctant to turn
your first meeting into a fight.
(03:14):
At 1:00 AM, the radio isblasting just as loud.
What kind of party are theythrowing down there?
You've got to get up for worktomorrow.
How can a person be so ignorant?
So you walk down to lecture thisidiot to common courtesy.
You knock heavily on the doorand it swings open.
(03:36):
"You are surprised to find theapartment completely bare.
There is no sign of your newneighbor.
There isn't even a sign offurniture.
So you walk in.
In the back room, you find somedrop cloths and paint cans.
Plugged into one wall, you see aboombox cranked up full.
(03:58):
"There is no neighbor, just acareless painter who left the
radio on when he left for theday.
The new tenant hasn't evenarrived yet.
The ignorant neighbor that youyou invented based on the noise
vanishes into air, but the angerand other emotions you felt are
still very real.
"You have trouble settling downand going back to sleep because
(04:20):
you're still angry at thisneighbor.
A neighbor who exists only inyour mind.
You created this evil figure toexplain the loud music, and he
took on a life of his own.
If you hadn't gone down andknocked on the door, you might
have lived with this illusionfor days.
(04:41):
"Your mental models shape theway you see the world.
They help you to quickly makesense of the noises that filter
in from outside, but they canalso limit your ability to see
the true picture.
They are with you always andlike your neighbors can be a
great help or can keep you up atnight without reason."
Harry (05:04):
Wow.
Man, so many things popped intomy head.
I don't know the work.
What is the book?
Jorge (05:14):
This is a book called The Power of Impossible Thinking and
the subtitle is Transform theBusiness of Your Life and the
Life of Your Business.
And it's by Yoram I hope Ipronounce that right Jerry Wind
and Colin Crook with RobertGunther.
And this is a book published byWharton.
(05:37):
It's a book about mental models,basically.
And that's what I was hoping wewould talk about today, because
mental models is one of thoseideas that is central to the
work of design and those of uswho do this kind of work develop
(06:00):
means to try to understandpeople's mental models and to
influence people's mentalmodels.
And it feels like one of thosedesign superpowers that maybe
other folks would benefit fromunderstanding and practicing.
Harry (06:16):
Wow.
I'm just writing a couple thingsdown here.
Have you ever done any work withIndi Young?
Jorge (06:24):
I've interviewed Indi for my previous podcast.
I haven't worked with herdirectly, but I admire her work.
And she did write a book calledMental Models, right?
Harry (06:32):
Yeah.
the reason a fourth[inaudble]things just jumped into my head
all at once.
And like one of those pens withfour colors, that you get to
select one color at a time.
Like, I kept in my brain, kepttrying to push them all up at
the same time and it all juststopped.
But the one that managed to getto the top was when I was at
Rackspace.
So I was the, the VP ofexperience design at Rackspace
(06:56):
when we were building the opencloud.
Hired Indi to come in, help usbuild out a mental model because
we had a fairly complicated andcomplex challenge that we needed
to get out of one mental frameand into another.
And my first experience movingfrom the concept and idea of a
(07:22):
mental model to the practice andthe map of a mental model was
working with Indi and it wasreally illuminating.
Anyway, Indy came in and helpedmy team build out a very
sophisticated mental model forhow to think about cloud
computing from the point of viewof a business user.
(07:43):
And it was really the first timethat I had a structure for how
to think about a mental model.
And that was the kind of thefirst thing that managed to pop
up through the pen into the tipwas, model as a concept before
working with Indi just likethese two words that were
(08:03):
very...
not ephemeral, but veryabstract.
And, then working with her, itturned into a very concrete way
of thinking about who isinvolved in something and what
do they want and need in thatcontext, and what would they go
(08:28):
about doing to achieve what theywant and need in that context,
which is interestingly, verysimilar to prioritization.
So that was the, very firstthought of going from this
abstract idea of what mentalmodels are to my first, I think,
concrete experience in having anoutput, a big map, right?
(08:50):
It was, I don't know, probablyeight feet long and four feet
tall of printer paper posted onthe inside of a wall at
Rackspace, where we could allsee what people...
what we hallucinated they wantedto do, and what the research
about who these users were, thecharacteristics and attributes
(09:13):
of their persona, what the taskswere that they were trying to
accomplish, and so on and soforth.
Anyway, that was the first thingthat jumped to mind.
Jorge (09:22):
One of Indi's many contributions to the field of
interaction design, userexperience design more broadly,
is turning this kind of somewhatvague idea about mental models
into an artifact that, to yourpoint, that people can point at
(09:43):
and discuss and see where thingscome from.
It's been many years since Iread that book, but as I recall,
the charismatic table that oftengets shown in slides and stuff
has to do with someone doingtheir morning routine if I'm not
mistaken, right?
They get up and then they dotheir morning toilet, and then
(10:06):
they do their breakfast.
And you can map out the thingsthey're doing and you could
investigate what they'rethinking as they're going about
doing that, right?
And then from that you mightstart making some assumptions
about how that person thinks ofthat particular situation and
the things they can and cannotdo there.
Harry (10:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
Another place it jumped was,I've been following Farnam
Street and Shane Parrish's workfor a long time I don't think it
was a month ago that I actuallygot my four-book set.
The different colors, his bookset called Mental Models, right?
(10:48):
It's all the differentframeworks and approaches for
thinking about thinking, AKAmental models.
And I'm, so excited to at somepoint crack open.
I think it's volume one, the redversion,,and start digging into
that to look at it from adifferent point of view.
(11:12):
Like, rather than looking at itthrough the lens of personas and
what they're trying toaccomplish and what the tasks
are and how they approach thingsand perhaps what assumptions
they're making and in this moreformalistic approach to mental
modeling.
I'm super excited about diggingin, going in from the bottom up
(11:36):
as it were, and maybe lookingthrough the lens of primitives,
if you will, the pieces ofmental models or possibly the
contributing components inmental models in hopes of trying
to build, not just this top downway I have of thinking about it
now, largely from Indi, but amore bottoms up oriented version
(12:01):
that might be able to exploitmany of the tools that I've
developed and you and I'm sureuse in our practice.
The other thing I thought ofwhile you were talking was, I
remember I took a class incollege, it was a social
psychology class with ElliotAronson.
(12:25):
He co-authored a book with awoman named Caroll Tavris called
Mistakes Were Made, But Not ByMe, which is for a long time one
of my favorite books.
And it was really looking atkind of the mechanics of
self-deception and how to thinkabout the role of cognitive
(12:45):
dissonance in how we perhapsmove through the world in a way
that is arguably easier so longas the way that we're moving
through the world is alignedwith who we think we are.
And when we start running intofriction with how we think or
(13:08):
how we're behaving because it'sin conflict with who we think we
are, even at a very unconsciouslevel, that creates this
dissonance.
And the book really outlinesthis fantastic way of thinking
about how we go about doingthings that seemingly are so
incongruent to how we wouldotherwise think of ourselves and
(13:29):
what we're approaching.
Jorge (13:30):
I, wanna circle back to that, but, but I want to take a
step back here, because I wasactually very glad that you
brought up Shane Parish's work.
I do not have the physicalbooks, I did buy the ebooks.
Again, But the reason I'm gladyou brought that up is because I
suspect that most people whohave heard the phrase mental
(13:51):
models today have heard itthrough Shane's work.
Harry (13:55):
Uh.
Jorge (13:56):
He's certainly the person who I think of as writing the
most about this more recently.
And I think that his usage isdifferent from Indi's.
He uses it in the sense ofCharlie Munger.
But I think that Indi's usage ofmental models, it's about how a
(14:17):
particular person, anindividual, sees a particular
part of their world.
Like I said, how do you thinkabout the beginning of your day,
right?
Like you're making breakfast andstuff like that.
And there's certain things thatyou do and certain things that
you expect to be there.
And as a designer, you try tounderstand the mental models
that people have about thedomain that you are designing
(14:39):
for.
I did a project where we weredesigning a system that was
meant to be used byneurosurgeons to diagnose
traumatic brain injuries.
The users of such a system bringa very particular mindset, and
you have to understand how thosefolks see the world to be able
to design that system.
(14:59):
That is one usage of mentalmodel.
And that's what I think of asthe traditional design usage of
mental models.
I think that the CharlieMunger/Shane Parrish usage
conceives of mental models asthinking tools.
So a mental model is some kindof shortcut that you have in
(15:21):
your mind to help you thinkabout something, right?
Harry (15:24):
Yeah, that's why I was calling them primitives.
I was trying to get at that sameidea, but maybe use the wrong
word.
Jorge (15:30):
right.
Well, but I think it's importantto call out because if you heard
the phrase"mental models"through Shane's work, and then
we're talking about the stuffthat Indi does, it might not be
connecting, because they arevery different things.
And it might be that the personwho's making their breakfast
does have mental models of thesort that Shane writes about.
(15:50):
But there are different focuses.
Now, to circle back to what youwere saying just before I
interrupted you, what I washearing there is that it would
be helpful for somebody to havegood models of their own mental
models.
Harry (16:11):
And that's especially true...
like, in the work that we didwith Indi, it wasn't so much
about the mental model of thepeople doing the work, it was
the people, myself included, whowere trying to design a
solution, needed to understandthe breadth of how all these
(16:35):
smaller mental models would fittogether.
The beginning of the day examplewas like one category in this
broad model.
And the thing is, in order todesign the entire experience we
needed to have not just themorning, but we needed to have
(16:57):
the day, and not just the day,but we needed to have the week
and we needed to have it frommultiple stakeholders.
We needed to be able to come atit from multiple points of view.
And so it was in effect a metamental model.
And a piece of it might havebeen the kind of mental model
that you were describing.
(17:18):
But the whole mental model thatwe built was really a meta
version of that.
And so, when I think aboutIndi's work, I think about
mental modeling more than Ithink about a mental model.
Jorge (17:31):
One way that I've put that in the past is that the
"deliverable" the diagram thatcomes out the other end might be
of use in that it helpsdesigners structure the product
or whatever.
(17:51):
But it's the process at arrivingat that diagram that has real
value.
The questions that you have toask, the research that you have
to do, it will in some waysforce you to confront aspects of
the context and perhaps thething that you're making to fit
(18:15):
into that context that you wouldnot have encountered otherwise.
Harry (18:21):
Yeah.
And as I was reflecting on this,it occurred to me that in the
executive coaching/psychologicaldomain, there is a similar
approach.
It's called the Immunity toChange model by Leahy and Kegan,
I think it is.
(18:41):
The Immunity to Change model andthere is a book on the subject
really looks at the types ofassumptions that underpin the
behaviors that you're eitherdemonstrating or not
demonstrating, that arepreventing you from getting
closer to what you want, suchthat you can challenge those
(19:04):
assumptions as uncritically heldbeliefs to determine to what
extent those assumptions are orare not true, which allows you
then to build a plan to getdifferent results.
And so, I had never made thatconnection before, but Immunity
to Change as a model is a mentalmodeling activity.
(19:29):
And it's very powerful forworking with people one-on-one.
And I suppose it could beapplied at an organizational or
a team level to generate changeas well.
Jorge (19:41):
Have you seen an example that might illustrate how that
approach works?
Harry (19:47):
I've used it in my work fairly extensively, but only at
the individual level.
So the Immunity to Change modelis a mental modeling tool, and
it is a very simple, yetincredibly powerful mechanism
for identifying the things thatwe're...
(20:11):
The Immunity to Change people,their business is called Minds
At Work, but the Immunity toChange people refer to those as
hidden commitments.
So these are things that you'recommitted to doing because it's
how you go about getting theresults that you're getting
today, even if those are at oddswith the results that you would
(20:32):
like to have in the future.
So the Immunity Map, which isthe one of the two central tools
that Immunity to Change presentsis a four column model that
starts with column one, it'syour commitment.
It's the thing that you reallywant to change.
It's really the one thing thatyou are really motivated to
(20:53):
change.
It is not for the, faint ofheart, right?
Column two is, what are youdoing or not doing today?
So this is your as-is state andthe things that you're doing
today might or might not behelping you achieve your goal
(21:17):
and the things you're not doingtoday might or might not be
helping you to achieve yourgoal, but the aggregate set of
things that you're doing and notdoing are not pushing you
forward fast enough to get thegoal that you're highly
motivated to get.
The third column is what theycharacterize as these hidden
(21:38):
commitments.
And these are the things thatyou're committed to pursuing
because this is the structure ofthe...
it's the glue of your mentalmodel, in a sense, right?
I have this goal, but I'm doingor not doing these things.
(21:59):
And when I look at why I'm doingthese things, I can tell you I
have a hidden commitment topursuing these things I'm doing
because of these beliefs I have.
And then the fourth column iswhat are the big assumptions
that sit underneath that.
I have an example here.
So commitment.
So I wanna, here's a, here's anexample of an improvement goal.
(22:23):
I wanna secure meaningful workthat allows me to provide for my
family.
Right now, this is a client Iwas working with who, a very
senior level person who wassuccessfully working in an arena
where they didn't feel it wasmeaningful and finding work that
(22:43):
paid enough was, in their mind,in conflict with meaningful
work.
So their commitment, theirimprovement goal was to secure
meaningful work that allows themto provide for their family.
And in the column two, what arethey doing or not doing?
So an example is, I'm trying toprove myself to people who hold
(23:08):
power.
So I want to be validated bythem.
Just happens to be a thing thatthis person's doing.
He's kissing up in a sense,right?
And here's a thing that he's notdoing: he's not calling people
from his past professionally, sohe's not mining his network.
And it turns out in this case,because he doesn't have a story
(23:29):
that he feels comfortable with.
And so, if you look at thehidden commitments, one of them
is he worries that he'd haveanother negative work
experience.
He's worried that if he goes andtakes another job, it's gonna be
another place where he gets paidwell, but it's soul sucking.
(23:50):
And so, the way that theImmunity to Change people look
at this is a hidden commitmentis, he's committed to having
negative work experiences in hiscurrent model, right?
He's demonstrating that.
He's had two jobs in a row, twosenior level jobs, where he has
(24:11):
gotten the job, and it payswell, but it's a negative
experience because it's notmeaningful.
He's committed to that.
But it's an unconsciouscommitment.
And in this particular case, Ididn't pull up a more complete
version of the map, but anassumption underneath that might
(24:33):
have been that findingmeaningful work that pays enough
is not possible.
That might be an assumption.
And so the Immunity to Changemodel says,"Okay, your job here
is to test that assumption." Butin order to test that
(24:56):
assumption, you have to knowwhat that assumption is.
In order to identify thatassumption, you have to
understand what you're committedto unconsciously, right?
In order to understand what yourunconscious commitments are, you
have to look at what you'redoing and not doing because that
demonstrates the activity thatsupports the hidden commitment,
(25:17):
that essentially confirms theassumption and it is
inconsistent with the goal.
So the only way to get out ofthis loop is to test the
assumptions and find out thatthey are, in fact, either not
true or they are true, whichwhatever happens to be the case
(25:37):
for you.
Or to what degree are theyeither true or not true such
that you might be able tochallenge them at the level of
your mental model.
So the mental model is aconstruct, in effect, of
assumptions, which areuncritically held beliefs that
are supported by hiddenunconscious commitments that you
(26:01):
have, and then how you manifestthose as behavior or lack of
behavior.
And that's this other way ofthinking about a mental model as
well.
It's super powerful forgenerating change.
Jorge (26:16):
It sounds like a tool to make the invisible visible in
service to coherence.
You have the stated goals, butthen you also...
it's like,"I wanna lose weight,but I also love ice cream,"
right?
And those two things are inconflict.
(26:37):
And as you were describing itreminded me, our common friend
Dave Gray, wrote a book calledLiminal Thinking that has a,
similar framework, right?
I forget exactly what Dave'sframework is, but I remember it
having the things that you dobeing influenced by the things
that you think being influencedby the things you believe, and
(26:59):
there's these very deep layers.
And it behooves you it behoovesus to try to bring them out to
the fore where you can admitthat you do have a conflict
there, which is keeping you fromgaining traction.
Harry (27:16):
That's exactly right.
That's a hundred percent right.
Oh, I love that.
because this is the entirepoint.
And the entire point is if youcan surface this stuff from the
unconscious to the conscious andyou can connect it with tools to
make it possible to get from acurrent as-is state to a future
(27:38):
to-be state, that's how you gettraction.
And then, you can move fromgetting traction to getting
momentum.
And from momentum to gettingvelocity.
And then you're really moving,or cooking with gas as they say.
Jorge (27:56):
We're not gonna be able to top that.
Let's, let's wrap it there.
as always, I learned so muchfrom our conversations.
That feels like a really usefulmodel to look into.
Thank you so much.
Harry (28:08):
Wow.
That was a good one.
Thank you so much.
Yeah.
Narrator (28:17):
Thank you for listening to Traction Heroes
with Harry Max and Jorge Arango.
Check out the shownotes@tractionheroes.com and if
you enjoyed the show, pleaseleave us a rating in Apple's
podcasts app.
Thanks.
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