Key terms in brief

Behavioral strategy connects strategy with behavioral research. It asks not only what an organization wants to achieve, but which behavior that requires from people – and what is holding that behavior back today. The result is interventions in processes, defaults, leadership signals and communication whose effect is measured. The method →

Behavioral economics studies how people actually decide when resources are scarce – money, time, attention: by habit, effort, social norms and perception, rarely by purely rational deliberation. It combines economics with psychology and tests its findings in experiments. More from the University of Chicago →

Nudging means shaping the environment of a decision so that the desired behavior becomes the obvious one – without bans, coercion or rewards. Every other option stays open. In organizations, nudging is the answer to rules that everyone knows and agrees with, yet nobody follows.

Choice architecture is the design of the situation in which a decision is made: order, defaults, number of options, timing and wording. There is no neutral design – every arrangement influences what is chosen.

A default is the option that applies when nobody does anything. Because people often keep defaults, they are among the best-documented levers of choice architecture.

Sludge is friction that makes desired behavior harder: unnecessary steps, forms, waiting times, unclear paths. Often the most effective intervention is not an extra prompt but a deleted step.

A dark pattern is a design that benefits only the provider and works only as long as nobody notices it. The difference from a nudge: a nudge makes the choice easier that is in the person’s own interest, and must still hold up when it is explained openly.

AI adoption means that employees actually use AI in their everyday work – regularly, independently and for their real tasks. Licenses and training create access; beliefs, norms and routines decide whether people use it. AI adoption →

Shadow AI means that employees use AI tools for their work that the company has not approved – usually through a private account. It is a risk, because nobody knows which data leaves the company, and a signal that the need is greater than the official offering.

P.U.R.E. describes four behavioral barriers to AI adoption: perspective (management rates the state of AI use higher than the teams do), uncertainty (unspoken norms and questions of status), resistance (knowledge stays in silos) and error culture (where failing isn’t allowed, learning doesn’t happen). The AI gap analysis with P.U.R.E. measures these barriers in an organization through interviews and a survey. P.U.R.E. was developed from behavioral research and from PEAK LANE STUDIO’s project work. The method →

CAMI is a framework for behavior change in four steps: context (in what situation is the decision made?), attention (is the topic on the radar at all?), motivation (does the person want to – and if not, why not?) and intervention (which intervention fits this combination?). The method →

A Signal Audit makes visible which signals an organization actually sends in everyday work – through decisions, routines, spaces and incentives – and where they contradict the official ambition. As a one-day format for leadership teams, it ends with a map of the signals and three prioritized interventions. The tool comes from the book “Führung wirkt zwischen den Worten”. Transformation & Teams →

Psychological safety is the shared belief in a team that one can ask questions, raise objections and admit mistakes without being exposed or punished. The term goes back to Harvard researcher Amy Edmondson. It is not a comfort zone but the precondition for people saying what they see during change.

A Behavioral Review reads an existing concept – for a rollout, a training, a pricing or membership model – against the behavioral evidence. The result is a list of findings with before-and-after suggestions, in one consulting day, before the concept is decided. AI adoption →