Note From President Vineet Bhatnagar
SEEING WHAT ISN’T THERE is a power that only humans possess. The source of human power is neither muscle nor mind but models. I had made a reference to mental models in one of my earlier pieces in this bulletin.
TO FRAME IS TO MAKE A MENTAL MODEL THAT ENABLES US TO SEE PATTERNS, PREDICT HOW THINGS WILL UNFOLD AND UNDERSTAND NEW SITUATIONS. Frames guide our decisions and the results that we attain. Some of the greatest
breakthroughs in humanity have been achieved through framing. How the Wright brothers, with no formal physics training gave us the first flight with exemplary framing. How deploying the #MeToo hashtag on Twitter reframed the
perception of sexual assault from shame to empowerment.
It is my view that framing is not just a way to improve how we make decisions in the era of computers and algorithms but will be a matter of survival for humanity in a time of social upheaval and machine prosperity. We can turn framing from a basic feature of human cognition into a practical tool that we can use to make better
decisions.
Framing is so fundamental to human cognition that even those who study the workings of human mind started focusing on it only recently. Most of the work was looking at the importance of sensing and memory but as people have become more aware of the need to improve decision making the role of frames which aids choices and action has become centre stage. There is no such thing as a “bad” frame but there are surely cases of misframing. In 2008, Nokia led the world in mobile phones and when Apple introduced the iPhone, few thought that it would take off. Nokia’s frame came from the conservative telecom industry whereas Apple came from breathlessly innovative computing industry that
valued ease of use despite being pricier. The Apple frame turned out to be a better fit for consumer needs and it now dominates the market.
A human mind can see the world not as it exists but as it can be. We do this by understanding, rejecting or accepting frames. THE FRONTIERS OF OUR IMAGINATION ARE THE BOUNDARIES OF OUR WORLD. HUMANITY IS NOT LOCKED INTO ONE REALITY BUT CAN ENJOY ANY IT DECIDES TO CREATE. The power is within us, by how we can conceive of and conceptualise our world and lives – all that we are and all that we hope to be. We thrive through co-operation but we will survive only as framers.
— President Vineet Bhatnagar