Mr. or Ms. Right: Is he/she out there? — Episode 2: The 37% Rule

I happened on this axiom many years ago, but Tim Harford's well-reasoned/intentioned advice to one Ruth of Barcelona, Spain — featured here just yesterday — occasioned a trawl back down memory lane (to mix a metaphor), and dredged up a superb discussion by Dr. David K. Smith of the Mathematical Statistics and Operational Research Department of the University of Exeter (UK) of this deceptively simple yet enormously useful rule applicable to all areas of life.

Long explanation short, in the context of romance: "Look at a fraction 1/e of the potential partners before making your choice and you'll have a 1/e chance of finding the best one."

Translated into English and applied to the workplace, "Once you have seen 37% of the application forms, a coherent picture of the ideal employee is built up and the next person to fulfil these criteria gets the job."

According to Smith, "Building models like this gives interesting results, but you don't know, at the age of zero, how many potential partners you are likely to meet in your lifetime. Dr. Peter Todd turned the problem around. Instead of trying to estimate the number of potential partners one could consider, he put forward a rule which would work for most people. He suggested that a typical person should count up to about a dozen potential partners, and then start hunting seriously. The first dozen would give enough information for a reasonable choice."

Now close the deal and live happily ever after.