Trust Through Transparency

Michael NortonHarvard Business School

Transparency

• Not just honesty• A communications effort

• But “showing your work”• A strategy

Transparency

4

Transparency

5

Enter your flight

“Blind”

Transparency

Transparency

• Better than:

• Marketing

• Entertainment

• And even:

• Instantaneous

Transparency

• Better than:

• Marketing

• Entertainment

• And even:

• Instantaneous

The algorithm was working hard for me.

Transparency

• And dating

Transparency

• And dating

Recommendation agents

Here are people you like

“Rejection” agents

Here are people you like Here are people you don’t like

Transparency

And our toughest challenge …

The submerged state

Transparency

• Expressed a desire for larger government with more services

• Perceived the government to be doing a better job

• And even: Government often does a better job than it’s given credit for

Use transparency to:

• Get more credit from your partner

• Get more credit from your coworkers

• Help your customers understand all of the services you provide them

Final thoughts

• What will you show?

• How will you show it?

• How will you measure success?

• Compared to what?• An experiment

Thank you

Michael Norton

Harvard Business School

mnorton@hbs.edu

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