While on holiday recently, my family and I found ourselves in a buffet restaurant. I don’t know about you, but I often feel uneasy about the number of hands that use the serving spoons in a buffet. Let’s face it, when you’re on holiday, the last thing you want is to get ill! This restaurant took a clever approach to reducing the risk. Instead of the usual “please wash your hands” sign that many (most!) people ignore, this restaurant had thought about how to make the behaviour happen, and importantly, how to make customers feel good about it too.
So what did they do?
As we entered, we were greeted by a cheerful team member who welcomed everyone and gently funnelled us through a hand-washing area. There were multiple wash basins, cheerful staff keeping an eye on things, and a catchy tune playing in the background. The team were singing and dancing about washing hands, making the experience not just mandatory but also fun and social, especially for the children.
This simple, yet hugely effective, approach is a brilliant example of good behaviour change techniques in action. But, what makes it so successful?
To unpick that, we’ll use the EAST framework, which was developed by the Behavioural Insights Team. The acronym outlines four principles for effective behaviour change: Easy, Attractive, Social, and Timely. Whatever the behaviour change required - whether you’re trying to guide customers to wash their hands in a restaurant or seeking to guide clients to take the best care of their animals – these principles are relevant and useful. Let’s take a closer look:
Making it Easy
The first principle, Easy, is all about removing barriers. Humans tend to give up on behaviours quickly if any effort is required. At the restaurant, the layout made it almost impossible to avoid washing your hands—no need to remember, no effort required. The action was made easy by design. Even more than that, the ‘wrong’ behaviour was made difficult, since it meant jumping over a barrier or walking straight past the wash basins, all under the gaze of the staff.
How can this be applied in veterinary practice? Here are just two ideas:
- Streamlined online booking: If you make an online booking system available to your clients (which arguably every practice should!) then look at it through your clients’ eyes. Is it user friendly and intuitive? Have you minimised the data entry and number of clicks required? Even just removing one step can make a huge difference to how easy something is to do.
- Clear treatment plans: Providing clients with simple, easy-to-understand treatment plans helps to increase the chances that they’ll follow them. Using infographics or step-by-step guides can help outline what they need to do next in an easy-to-consume way.
Making it Attractive
Next is Attractive. For behaviours to happen, we need to catch attention and create engagement. The restaurant did this by making hand washing fun. The singing, the dancing, the vibrant atmosphere—it all made the action more appealing. Other ways to make behaviours attractive include incentives (such as discounts, gifts, rewards, points) and personalisation.
Here’s a couple of ideas how this can be put into practice in our veterinary context:
- Engaging appointment reminders: Sending personalised appointment reminders (e.g. that are addressed to the animal) will help make the reminder more appealing and harder to ignore.
Making it Social
The third principle, Social, taps into our natural tendency to follow the crowd. At the restaurant, everyone was washing their hands, and the staff’s enthusiastic participation reinforced this social norm.
In a veterinary practice, creating a social environment where positive behaviours are the norm can be powerful. For example:
- Community challenges: Organising animal health-related challenges for clients, where they can participate and share their progress on social media. This will encourage others to join in and help clients maintain healthy habits for their animals.
- Peer Learning: Encouraging peer learning among staff by setting up regular “Lunch and Learn” sessions where team members share and discuss success stories and best practices, fostering a collaborative environment focused on continuous improvement.
Making it Timely
Finally, Timely refers to prompting people to act at the right moment. The restaurant’s setup ensured that hand washing happened immediately on arrival, right when it was most needed.
In veterinary practice, timing can be everything. For example:
- Reminder time: Reminders only really work when they arrive at a time when the client is motivated to act. So, think about when and ow frequently your reminders are sent – are they timely?
- Seasonal Campaigns: Timely campaigns, such as anxiety management ahead of firework times, tick prevention at the height of the tick season or heatstroke prevention tips in the summer, help to prompt action at the time when it’s most needed.
EAST for the win!
The lesson from my holiday experience is clear: whilst changing behaviour can sometimes be hard, it doesn’t have to be. Whenever you want to drive any behaviour change, take a moment to check whether you’re making it easy, attractive, social and timely. Just that one simple step might lead to big behavioural changes.
Do you need help driving behaviour change? Contact Us to find out how we can help.
