The Marshmallow Problem
“The Theory of Iteration”
Learning the basics of the theory is an important component of any field. Beyond that, however, it’s important to keep in mind that everything we practice is done in the interest of real-world applications. This may not seem like a terribly important issue, but this misunderstanding is pervasive in how we teach ourselves to build the future.
Take the marshmallow challenge, for example.
Author and Singularity University professor Tom Wujec often gives this test to widely differing groups of people. The rules are simple. Participants are given 18 minutes in teams of four to build the tallest freestanding structure that supports a single marshmallow using only 20 sticks of spaghetti, one yard of tape, and one yard of string. The challenge has been taken by engineers, architects, business executives, MBAs, and even kindergarteners. Without fail, MBAs do worse than every aforementioned group. Yes, even the kindergarteners.
To understand why, we need to look into the process we often teach ourselves when looking at innovation. Once a business student has an idea, they’re likely taught to write a comprehensive business plan, seek investment, build the product, and release it into the market, where they’ll be swarmed with consumers begging them for access. As you might figure, that’s not how it usually works. In reality, human behavior is extremely difficult to predict. Outside the controlled confines of game theory, humans often act erratically and even irrationally when presented with certain scenarios, meaning what’s in everyone’s best interest often isn’t the outcome.
Kindergartners, on the other hand, are naturally erratic. They play, tinker, and see what sticks. This is the sole reason for their dominance over MBAs in the challenge. To innovate well, we need to break out of the norms taught to us, and take on a kindergartner’s mindset. In planning incessantly before taking any action, we’re setting ourselves up to execute perfectly on what will likely end up being a fundamentally flawed plan.
The results of this mindset aren’t insignificant. Since the 1980s, the US has seen an explosion in the number of programs teaching people to start businesses. In that same time period, we’ve seen a consistent decrease in new companies started and an increase in the number of them failing.
This phenomenon lies largely in a misallocation of time. Going back to the idealistic process taught to MBAs today, we find that the most fundamental piece of the puzzle is being left out until the end: people.
“Build it and they will come,”
in most cases, is a total fallacy. Rather than trying to predict how people will respond to what you build, make feedback and iteration a central component of your process. In constantly adapting, you’ll ensure you have at least a general idea of how people will react.
So what’s our takeaway here? After all, MBAs probably do startups better than kindergarteners anyways. At the end of the day the goal shouldn’t be to throw process out the window altogether. Rather, we should be mindful not to lose the kindergartner in us. If we want to build something truly paradigm-shifting, we’re venturing into uncharted territory by definition. With that in mind, playful testing is in many cases the best course of action.
So get out there — dream like a kid and test like a grown-up.
Contributors: Written by Alex LaBossiere-Barrera, Illustration by Amanda Song