1) Common sense is not always an accurate way to explain complex events or predict the future. It can lead to circular reasoning, hindsight bias, and overconfidence. 2) Using common sense to explain why certain things like artworks or books became famous ignores external factors, luck, and that many similar things did not become famous. 3) Rather than relying solely on common sense or past examples, organizations should test different strategies, respond flexibly to changes, and crowdsource ideas to have the best chance of success, which can never be guaranteed.

1. Everything is obvious
Once you know the answer
By
Duncan J. Watts
Presented by: Rafquat Farooq Qaisrani

2. o Finding ONE cause for a complex event & inventing cause-effect
scenarios
o Circular Reasoning
o Hindsight bias: using common sense for evaluating and explaining those
events that have already happened
o Creeping Determinism: Over a certain event, saying that they could have
made exact predictions
Natural Human Behavior

3. Challenging use of Common Sense
o How success happened in past?
o How things in present can be made famous?
o How to anticipate factors for making future
success to happen?

4. How, in past, success happened to :
 Mona Lisa Painting
 Shakespeare
 Facebook
 Harry Potter etc.

5. How Common Sense explains these examples:
• Because these things are actually special
(although the same other things didn’t become famous)
• People like these things so there must be something
(although we couldn’t see for ourselves that what's so special?)
• We should delve deeper in order to find that specialty
(although we are actually forcing ourselves to like)

6. Reality Check:
• Circular Reasoning
• Social Norms and standards
• External impacts
• Luck
• Special People along with their popularity

7. What Common sense suggests:
• Hire influencers and “special” people
(although we cant exactly know whom we should choose and how many?)
• Follow examples from the past
(although a lot of companies that were successful don’t exist now)
• Motivate employees by offering financial incentives
(although incentives psychologically pressurizes and halts innovation
because people stop taking risks)
• Hire famous CEOs
(although a single person can’t guarantee success to a huge empire)

8. Reality check:
• Nothing can ever predict exact ways that would guarantee
success in future

9. What shouldn’t we do?
• Stuffing common sense in every matter
• Believing that you know everything
• Predicting human behaviors using common sense
• Expecting that looking into past guarantees the success
• Making patterns using past events

10. What shouldn’t we do? (continued………)
• Thinking that 100% success is possible
• Uncontrollably predicting future without factual data
• Figuring out cause-effect
• Holding a single person for success or failures
• Ignoring effects of external events

11. • Stop anticipating future and start focusing Present
• Combine common sense, possibilities and experimentation
• Applying strategic flexibility by testing different strategies and
discarding the useless.
• Responding quickly to the change in present situation
• Measure and react Strategy
What should we do?

12. What should we do? (continued….)
• Bootstrapping: Identification, tracing and solving problem by stopping whole
process when the problem occurs
• Bucket testing: Real-time assessment by directly applying strategy
• Crowdsourcing: Choosing right strategy by taking bulky public opinion

13. Conclusion
No matter how subtly steps are taken
nothing can guarantee success. There are
social and natural injustices, sudden
paradigm shifts and various unknown factors
that can impact success.
.