Polle de Maagt 
Polle de Maagt
Send ten people out for ice cream with one condition: they all have to agree on a single flavour. They come back with chocolate or vanilla. Not because anyone's favourite is vanilla, but because it is the flavour nobody objects to.
Groups don't agree on what's interesting. They agree on what's easy to agree on.
nobody hates it, nobody loves it
Where it comes from.
The idea is from Eli Altman of A Hundred Monkeys, a naming agency in Berkeley. He calls it the Ice Cream Principle, in his naming workbook Don't Call It That (2013). His advice to clients: don't pick a name just because it got the most votes. I first came across it in 2020, quoted by brand strategist Sol Horowitz, while writing up the other ice cream principle.
Why it happens.
In a group, every person holds a small veto. Each option that someone dislikes drops out, so what survives is what nobody dislikes. That is a different thing from what somebody loves. The more voices, the safer and blander the outcome.
It shows up far beyond names: in taglines, in strategy statements everyone can sign, in the one direction a whole management team can live with. It sounds like consensus. Often it is the absence of a choice.
Try it.
Next time a group has to choose, don't vote on the finalists. Hear everyone, then let one owner decide. Or change the question: not "which one can we all live with?" but "which one would someone fight for?"
The same name, a different lesson: If you can't fix it with ice cream, on what actually repairs trust.
