Four short links: 23 April 2018
Metrics and Incentives, Facebook as Fire Starter, Meeting Mastery, and Weird Chart Types
- Heart Surgeons Avoid Difficult Operations to Avoid Poor Performance Rankings — Just under one-third of the 115 specialists who responded said they had recommended a different treatment path to avoid adding another death to their score. And 84% said they were aware of other surgeons doing the same. Reminds me of MySociety’s hard-learned lessons with their MP scorecard, whereby MPs would ask pointless questions in Parliament just to get their numbers up.
- When Countries are Tinderboxes, and Facebook is a Match (NYT) — where institutions are weak or undeveloped, Facebook’s newsfeed can inadvertently amplify dangerous tendencies. Designed to maximize user time on site, it promotes whatever wins the most attention. Posts that tap into negative, primal emotions like anger or fear, studies have found, produce the highest engagement, and so proliferate. Plenty of horrifying examples of lynchings and riots triggered by Facebook posts.
- Reflections (Matt Webb) — Much of any founder’s time will be spent meeting advisors and investors. There’s a knack to running the room and getting what you want out of it, while maintaining a feeling of collaboration and conversation. Meetings aren’t just time you spend in a room together. Meetings are an atomic unit of work. They should have purpose and outcomes, although these don’t necessarily need to be stated. There are a lot of small ways to make sure attendees don’t drift or feel lost. Really fascinating notes about how he coaches his founders through the incubator program.
- Xeno.graphics — weird but (sometimes) useful charts.
