Professor Huggy Rao, a leading expert on collective action, discusses his insightful concepts from The Friction Project. He emphasizes how some workplace friction can be beneficial, urging leaders to eliminate 'bad friction' through clear communication. Rao highlights the dangers of jargon and advocates for simplicity to enhance understanding. Through examples like AstraZeneca, he showcases how effective communication can foster a culture of curiosity. Additionally, he shares the art of storytelling as a powerful tool for connection and empathy in professional settings.
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volunteer_activism ADVICE
Simplified Communication for Scaling
Use clear and concise language when communicating company mindsets, especially as your organization scales.
Ensure even a 10-year-old can grasp your message on the first try.
question_answer ANECDOTE
AstraZeneca's Gift of Time
AstraZeneca saved 2 million work hours by simplifying processes, framing it as a "gift of time" to employees.
Even a security guard, inspired by the initiative, gave back 30 minutes daily, highlighting the impact.
insights INSIGHT
The Two Sides of Friction
"Friction", meaning obstacles, can be both beneficial and detrimental in a business context.
Good friction slows down potentially bad decisions, while bad friction hinders productivity and creativity.
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Market Rebels by Hayagreeva Rao challenges traditional economic analyses by highlighting the role of activists in shaping markets. The book demonstrates how activists, or 'market rebels,' can both promote and impede radical innovations through social movements. Examples include the automobile industry, craft brewing, and nouvelle cuisine, showing how these movements create new markets or block existing ones. Rao emphasizes the importance of 'hot causes' and 'cool mobilization' in driving collective action.
The Friction Project
How Smart Leaders Make the Right Things Easier and the Wrong Things Harder
Huggy Rao
Robert Sutton
The Friction Project by Robert I. Sutton and Huggy Rao focuses on the concept of friction in organizations, highlighting both its positive and negative aspects. The authors provide tools and strategies for identifying, assessing, and addressing friction, including 'friction forensics' and a 'help pyramid.' They delve into common friction troubles such as oblivious leaders, addition sickness, broken connections, jargon monoxide, and fast and frenzied people and teams. The book emphasizes the importance of leaders acting as 'friction fixers' to improve communication, cooperation, and collaboration, and to maintain a productive workplace culture[2][4][6].
Scaling Up Excellence
Bob Sutton
Friction — that’s Professor Huggy Rao’s metaphor for the forces that hamper workplace efficiency. But as he says, some friction can be helpful — if you know how to use it.
In his book, The Friction Project: How Smart Leaders Make the Right Things Easier and the Wrong Things Harder, Rao and coauthor Robert I. Sutton explore how operational obstacles show up in the workplace and, more importantly, what we can do about them. Through what Rao calls “friction fixing,” leaders can “take out the bad friction to make the right things easy to do [and] put in good friction to make the wrong things harder [to do].”
As Rao discusses with host Matt Abrahams on this episode of Think Fast, Talk Smart, leaders can eliminate bad friction through good communication. “Communication matters a lot,” he says. “The simple rule is, make sure a 10-year-old can understand it on the first try.”
Think Fast Talk Smart: Communication Techniques 
