In Look Again: The Power of Noticing What Was Always There, Cass Sunstein, together with his co-author Tali Sharot, discusses the importance of reevaluating the familiar to discover new insights.

Sunstein has long been at the forefront of behavioral economics. He is the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard Law School and served as the administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Obama administration. He has authored numerous best sellers, such as Nudge and The World According to Star Wars., In his new book, he explores the effects of habituation—ceasing to notice the familiar.

Together with Martin Reeves, Chairman of the BCG Henderson Institute, Sunstein discusses the perils of habituation and how to see the unseen. He also identifies ways that company leaders can strategically avoid habituation to ensure their organizations do not get stuck in mental models that limit adaptability to new trends and challenges.

Key topics discussed: 

[01:09] How habituation works
[04:25] What dishabituation is
[08:18] How to see the unseen
[13:51] How corporations should think about (dis-)habituation
[22:08] Breaking free from a mental model
[24:21] Personal strategies for dishabituation

Additional inspirations from Cass Sunstein:

• Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment; co-authored by Daniel Kahneman and Olivier Sibony (Little Brown Spark, 2021)
• The World According to Star Wars (Dey Street Books, 2016)
• Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness; co-authored by Richard Thaler (Penguin Books, 2009)