Is knowledge of social psychology valuable to understanding the performance and resilience of companies?

➡️ Is knowledge of social psychology valuable to understanding the performance and resilience of companies?

➡️ Is corporate culture a key differentiator and important to an organization’s results and an investor’s asset selection?

➡️ Is it vital to be curious, keep learning and to bring together different areas of expertise and academic disciplines?

Of course you would expect me to say yes. It’s my confirmation bias.

And you may think it’s fluff, and not important when compared to the hard-nosed reality of sales, product development and profit margins.

A nice to have, an after-thought if time allows, a luxury cherry on top of the tough cake of business reality.

So ignore me if you must.

But perhaps you should consider the views of Nicolai Tangen.

As CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management, he is one of the most important investors in the world, responsible for a c£1.4 trillion fund and 1.5% of total global equity market capitalization.

His thoughts on these questions and others are covered in a recent talk he gave at the LSE Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science in conversation with Tom Reader

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JklMprHGoHY

You will learn about the straight puck award, what may come next after degrees in Russian, Finance, Organizational Psychology and Art History (perhaps Anthropology and Music), and why admitting you are pathetic at golf is a good thing.

And the imperative for cultural and behavioural understanding in corporate life.