The Logic Of Failure

TheLogicOfFailure: Recognizing and Avoiding Error in Complex Situations, by Dietrich Doerner ISBN 0-201-47948-6

(originally in German: Die Logik des Misslingens; and the "oe" in Doerner really is an Umlaut-o.)

Great Book on patterns of human thought that just don't work, especially in complex, networked, intransparent and dynamic situations.

The author, a psychologist, put subjects into complex, networked, ... situations using complex computer simulations (similar to Civilization or SimCity, but more realistic and difficult), and analyzed their behaviour: What kind of questions do they ask, when do they ask them, what kind of decisions do they make, and how are these systematically wrong?

Trivial example (from my memory): Humans have a hard time dealing with shapes in time, that is, dynamic situations. Experiment: Subjects had a dial controlling an oven in a room and a thermometer. They were told to aim for a certain, steady temperature. There was a certain time lag between a change in the dial and its effect on the room temperature. Result: Most subjects did considerably worse than if they hadn't touched the dial at all! They underestimated the time lag, they over-reacted, and they were not patient enough.

A fascinating read, and IMHO highly relevant to (software) project management. --FalkBruegmann

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