Nudge theory and hand washing
In their new book, Ripple: The big effects of small behaviour change in business, authors Jez Groom and April Vellacott highlight that hand washing is not a nudge reserved solely for COVID-19.
As part of a team of behavioural scientists working for Cowry Consulting – which helps major brands apply theories such as nudge into customer and employee experience outcomes – Groom was once hired by a global hygiene solutions company to try and encourage more rigorous hand-washing among employees in a Chilean abattoir, as a result of falling into bad habits during break periods. Their solution was a novel ‘nudge’:
“One idea clearly stood out amongst the rest: a washable handstamp to be inked onto workers' hands during each break,” says Groom, who is the founder of Cowry Consulting and was part of the on-site team working with the abattoir.
