Understanding people turns out to be a more urgent task than changing them, and a great deal harder. The usual story is that we are careless calculators. The better story is that we are careful about the wrong things. What looks like patience from the outside is usually something simpler from the inside: tiredness, a deadline, a wish not to look foolish. A pattern this consistent is not a character flaw. It is a design feature, and design features can be worked with.
Where the model breaks
The measure that matters is not what people say about patience but what they do when nobody is scoring. Institutions know all this, of course, which is why the free sample is so rarely left to chance. Understanding people turns out to be a more urgent task than changing them, and a great deal harder. Ask most people why they did what they did and they will give you a reason; ask them again a week later and the reason will have quietly changed.
Put a number on patience and it becomes a target; put a target on it and the number stops meaning what it meant. Ask most people why they did what they did and they will give you a reason; ask them again a week later and the reason will have quietly changed. It is tempting to call this irrational. It is more useful to ask what it is for. The honest conclusion is uncomfortable for reformers: people are not waiting to be corrected.
