Dr. Tali Sharot Speaking Topics

• Mental Time Travel: optimism, imagination, and how thinking about the future alters the present

  As our world is rapidly changing, companies and governments are occupied with the question of what the future holds. Imagining the future is a marvellous ability that can foster creativity and innovation. But our capacity to think about the future is also constrained • by the past, by what we hope will be true and by our current beliefs. In this talk, Sharot shares what science tells us about the human ability for “mental time travel”; how we can use this skill to our advantage avoiding poor planning and systematic mispredictions. Sharot builds on her pioneering discoveries in this area, described in her book ‘The Optimism Bias’, to explain how we can better prepare for, and shape, the future, today.

• Influence: How You Affect the Opinions, Decisions and Desires of Others

  Part of our daily job as humans is to affect others; we advise our clients, guide our patients, teach our children and inform our online followers. Yet, science shows we systematically fall on to suboptimal habits when trying to change others' beliefs • from insisting the other is wrong to exerting control. Based on her award-winning book, The Influential Mind, internationally acclaimed behavioral neuroscientist, Tali Sharot, explains how an attempt to alter beliefs will be successful only if it is well-matched with the core elements that govern how we think and feel. By understanding the minds and brains of those around us, we become better at advising and communicating information.

Smart Choice: Making Better Decisions using behavioural science

Making good decisions is key to the success of any company and a critical skill for leaders and investors. Yet, making wise choices, whether regarding finances, business or health, is difficult. We now know that human decision-making is rife with bias; from over-confidence to irrational optimism and future discounting. The good news is that understanding where people go wrong enables us to improve the decision-making process. Sharot occupies a unique spot at the intersection of behavioural economics, neuroscience and psychology. From this rare seat Sharot integrates up-to-date research in decision science and transforms this knowledge into practical insights. In this lively talk Sharot helps the audience identify systematic decision-making errors and offers methods for corrections and improvement.

The Business of Moving Others: Using the New Science of the Mind to Induce Behavioral Change

A major goal of managers and companies is to induce behavioral change. We want to influence the actions of our clients, employees and colleagues in positive ways. Sharot has advised some of the world largest companies, including Pepsi, Bank of America and Prudential, on inducing behavioural change. In this engaging, thoughtful and humours presentation Sharot shares which factors • according to empirical findings • have the largest impact on peoples’ actions, and why. Using her own cutting-edge science she explains how we can use innate human tendencies to nudge people in the right direction, and which commonly used approaches often back-fire. The audience learn powerful practical applications for inducing change and gains a deeper understanding of human behaviour.

Moving Forward

The current pandemic has forced people to change the way they work, live and interact. How can leaders help their teams thrive and adapt to the “new normal”? What are the likely obstacles workers face and how can they be overcome? How can we best navigate stress, anxiety, uncertainty and a restricted sense of agency? Does the crisis bring with it an opportunity to evolve? When under threat people come together; social cohesion is observed and people feel a new need to conduct meaningful work. This sense of “togetherness” and motivation can be harnessed. Research from behavioural economics, psychology and neuroscience, provides useful insight into what people are going through and how to move forward successfully at work and at home.

Raising our Heads out of the Sand – Effective Decision Making and How to Avoid Pitfalls by Managing the “Ostridge Effect”

Many of our costly professional and personal mistakes could have been avoided if we had taken a good look at the evidence in front of us. Take the financial meltdown of 2008; economists have concluded that warnings signs were out there and timely action could have saved the market. Why then do we insist on imitating an ostridge, and is there anything we can do to raise our heads out of the sand? In this presentation Tali Sharot explains the dangers of the “ostridge effect” to managers, policy makers and companies. Using her own work as well as other’s from psychology, neuroscience and behavioral economics, Tali shows that the tendency to look away when reality is undesirable is fundamental to human nature and thus difficult to overcome. It is therefore crucial to form strategies and policies to manage this human tendency before it leads to disaster. Tali outlines best practices for leaders and employees that will help do so.