Learn how to motivate positive behaviour change

On this three-week course, you’ll learn how to promote positive behaviour change in your employees through effective incentives and an awareness of default behaviours.

You’ll also explore customer behaviours and the role commitment plays in their decision-making.

Through an understanding of incentivisation, default behaviours, and commitment, you’ll recognise the role these play in motivating positive behaviour change in both your employees and customers.

Explore how mental accounting affects the response to incentives

To help increase the success of your incentives, you’ll explore the role of reference points and mental accounting.

You’ll also examine defaults – the pre-selected options available if an individual doesn’t make an active choice. You’ll explore how they exert influence, even if they have significant consequences, and why they work so effectively in anything from pension choices to hospital care.

Understand the use of different incentives

Exploring different types of incentives such as financial and pro-social, you’ll learn how successful they are in affecting behaviour change.

You’ll also explore the difference between incentives and commitments and consider how you could use commitment pledges to change behaviour in a professional setting.

Understand key learnings in behavioural science

By the end of the course, you’ll have a solid understanding of the behavioural economic factors that can influence your employees and customers.

Guided by Paul Dolan, Professor of Behavioural Science at the London School of Economics and Political Science, you’ll have the skills and knowledge to start pushing for positive behavioural change in your workplace.

Syllabus

Week 1
Incentives
- Welcome
  Welcome to Behavioural Economics: Employee and Customer Behaviour. In this first week on incentives, Paul will introduce you to the tried and tested method of changing behaviour with financial incentives.
- Sticks and carrots for behaviour change
  In this activity, you will be able to discuss the use of different types of incentives and how well they can affect behaviour change.
- Quirks of incentives: reference points
  In this activity, you will learn how to think about the role of reference points and mental accounting in conditioning the response to incentives.
- Quirks of incentives: time and risk preferences
  In this activity, you will understand how to differentiate between incentives which have risk and/or time components and those which don’t, and to think about how to use both.
- Crowding in and out, extrinsic vs intrinsic motives
  In this activity, you will be able to appreciate the relationship between financial incentives and prosocial motives.
- Wrap up
  In this activity we will summarise what you have learned about incentives and learn a little about the topic of next week: commitments.
Week 2
Commitments
- Commitment
  In this activity, you will be able to consider how you could use commitment pledges to change your own behaviour.
- Commitments in practice
  Here, you will consider how you could use commitment pledges to change behaviour in a professional setting and link commitments with other things you have learned in this course, such as incentives and social influences.
- Soft and hard commitments
  In this activity, you'll discuss the different types of commitments and think about which is most appropriate in which context.
- Peer Graded Assignment: MINDSPACE in Practice
  In this activity, you will use everything you've learned so far from MINDSPACE and will create an assignment relating to your workplace or a similar environment.
- Wrap up
  In this activity we will summarise what you have learned about commitments and look forward to the next week about defaults.
Week 3
Defaults
- Commitment
  In this activity, you will be able to consider the widespread presence of defaults and the role of inertia in much of your (and others’) decision-making.
- Defaults and pensions
  In this activity, you will be able to discuss ways to improve default options by using what you have learned in behavioural science, and will have a working knowledge of the widely used pension plans that harness defaults.
- Why do defaults work?
  In this activity, you will think creatively about what you have learned in behavioural science and how it relates to the success of defaults.
- Defaults and the ethics of nudging
  In this activity, you will debate and discuss the role of ethics in nudging, with special reference to the case of defaults.
- Wrap up
  In this activity, you'll reflect on everything you've learned over the past few weeks about the application of behavioural science in the workplace.

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Learning on this course

On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

Discuss the use of different types of incentives and how well they can effect behaviour change.
Examine the role of reference points and mental accounting in conditioning the response to incentives.
Differentiate between incentives which have risk and/or time components and those which don’t, and think about how to use both.
Explore the relationship between financial incentives and pro-social motives.
Consider the widespread presence of defaults and the role of inertia in much of their (and others’) decision-making.
Discuss ways to improve default options based on key learnings in behavioural science.
Discuss the role of ethics in nudging, with special reference to the case of defaults.

Who is the course for?

This course is designed for anyone who wants to learn more about human behaviours and needs.

It will be particularly useful if you are a professional managing, building, or developing a team.

Who will you learn with?

Paul Dolan

Paul is a Professor of Behavioural Science. His main research interests are human behaviour and happiness. Author of bestselling Happiness by Design and Happy Ever After, host of Duck-Rabbit podcast.

Who developed the course?

FutureLearn

FutureLearn is a leading social learning platform and has been providing high quality online courses for learners around the world over the last ten years.

About this ExpertTrack

Discover the skills to unlock positive behavioural change in your customers and employees with behavioural scientist Paul Dolan.

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