Not Invented Here is a bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0497, within the Social family. The core principle: a bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
Scientific Definition
A bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group.
Plain-English Definition
A bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group.
Feynman Explanation
If we did not build it, it cannot be good.
Core Principle
A bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
A bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
NIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
If we did not build it, it cannot be good.
Examples
- A company rejects a proven vendor tool to build an inferior internal version.
- NIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress.
Pending editorial review.
Original analysis from The Incentives Lab — how this element behaves inside real payoff structures.
Why this element matters to incentive design
When this element shows up in a diagnostic, the instinct is to train people out of it. Training rarely moves it. The mechanism underneath it is straightforward: a bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group. You can recognize it in the field by its signature: if we did not build it, it cannot be good. Every element in the Cognition dimension changes the perceived payoff of an action before the action happens, which is exactly where incentive design has leverage.
How it gets exploited
Left undesigned, nIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress. It is amplified whenever nIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress. Inside organizations that shows up as nIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress. The pattern is the same one Goodhart's Law describes: the measurable proxy attracts the effort, and the purpose behind it quietly loses funding.
How the Lab designs around it
The redesign move is to evaluate solutions by total cost of ownership, not origin. The test of any redesign here is simple: after the change, can you name what the organization is now doing less of? If not, the payoff structure did not actually move.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Evaluate solutions by total cost of ownership, not origin.
Measurement Approaches
Pending editorial review.
Evidence
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
The Perverse Incentive Lens™
How this behavior is exploited — and how to redesign around it.
- Evaluate solutions by total cost of ownership, not origin.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Interactive Mini Network
Click any neighbor to re-center the graph and follow the threads of connection.
Knowledge Graph Neighbors
Auto-linked to the rest of the Human Behavior Taxonomy by family, domain, dimension, and shared keywords.
A group decides on a course of action that nobody actually wants, because everyone assumes others prefer it.
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We attribute our own actions to situations but others' actions to their character.
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Sacrificing for others without expecting a personal reward.
Masking the sponsors of a message to make it appear grassroots.
Disagreement grows more extreme as the parties think more about the issue.
Systematic errors in explaining the causes of behavior — yours or others'.
We accept vague, general statements as personally meaningful.
Adding the word 'because' (with any reason) increases compliance dramatically.
Behaviors spread through groups via observation and imitation.
We come to like people we've done a favor for, more than people who've helped us.
Where Not Invented Here is cited in the corpus
Essays, field guides, and diagnostics from The Incentives Lab that apply this element.
- EssayGoodhart's Law in the Real World
How measurable proxies capture judgment.
- EssayThe Perverse Incentives Hiding in Your KPIs
Cognitive shortcuts turned into scorecards.
- EssayAI Agents Inherit Your Incentives
How this element propagates into automated systems.
- ReferenceThe Periodic Table of Human Behavior
The full 1,267-element map this page belongs to.
- CourseIncentives 101
The free ten-part primer on reading a payoff structure.
Questions about Not Invented Here
- What is Not Invented Here?
- Not Invented Here is a bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0497, within the Social family. The core principle: a bias against ideas or products that originated outside the group. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
- What is an example of Not Invented Here?
- NIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress. The Incentives Lab catalogs everyday, organizational, and historical instances of this element on its Human Behavior Taxonomy™ page (HBT-COG-0497).
- How is Not Invented Here exploited?
- NIH syndrome wastes resources and slows progress.
- How do you design around Not Invented Here?
- Evaluate solutions by total cost of ownership, not origin.
- Which behavioral dimension does Not Invented Here belong to?
- Not Invented Here is classified in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™, family "Social", class "Mental Model". Its permanent identifier is HBT-COG-0497 and its evidence grade is B.