Writing for Decision Makers
Writing for decision-makers: lead with recommendation, provide supporting evidence, quantify impact, address risks, specify next steps and timeline.
October 2025
September 2025
Team Decision Making
Team decision-making: consensus for buy-in on big changes, consultative for input with clear owner, democratic for equal stake, autocratic when urgent.
December 2024
What Is the Status Quo Bias: Why We Prefer What Already Exists
Status quo bias is our tendency to prefer the current state of affairs over change. Learn about Samuelson and Zeckhauser's research, loss aversion, and how to overcome it.
November 2024
What Is the Recency Bias: How Recent Events Distort Judgment
Recency bias causes people to overweight recent events in their judgments and decisions. Learn the psychology, investing implications, and how to counteract it.
October 2024
What Is the Cobra Effect: When Metrics Become the Enemy of Goals
Goodhart's Law states that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure. Learn how gaming metrics destroys value — and how to design better ones.
July 2024
How the Brain Makes Decisions: The Neuroscience of Choice
How does the brain make decisions? Explore the neuroscience of choice: somatic markers, dopamine reward, the prefrontal cortex, and why emotion is essential to good judgment.
January 2024
How Willpower Works: The Science of Self-Control
Willpower is not a character trait — it's a set of cognitive mechanisms that can be understood, managed, and improved. Here's what the science actually shows about self-control.
December 2023
Why Smart People Make Bad Financial Decisions: The Psychology of Money
Smart people make terrible financial decisions all the time. Behavioral economics explains the cognitive biases — loss aversion, present bias, mental accounting — that override rational thinking.
When to Trust Your Intuition (and When Not To): The Science of Gut Decisions
Research shows intuition is reliable in some domains and dangerously unreliable in others. Learn the conditions under which expert intuition is trustworthy and when analytical reasoning should override it.
What Is Behavioral Finance? When Markets Meet Psychology
Behavioral finance explains how psychological biases distort investment decisions and market prices. From Kahneman and Tversky's prospect theory to nudge design and the 2008 crisis, here is what the research shows.
The Regret Minimization Framework: Jeff Bezos's Method for Major Life Decisions
The regret minimization framework is Jeff Bezos's decision-making method: project yourself to age 80 and ask which choice you will regret not having made. A systematic approach to overcoming short-term fear in long-term decisions.
November 2023
Pre-Mortem Analysis: How to Find What Will Go Wrong Before It Does
Pre-mortem analysis is a prospective technique that imagines a project has already failed and works backward to identify causes. Gary Klein's method for surfacing hidden risks before they become real problems.
Decision Journaling: How to Systematically Improve Your Judgment Over Time
Decision journaling is the practice of recording your reasoning at the time of a decision and reviewing outcomes later. The most practical method for identifying and correcting systematic biases in your own thinking.
The Most Important Cognitive Biases and How They Affect Your Thinking
Cognitive biases are systematic errors in reasoning identified by Kahneman, Tversky, and decades of research. Learn which biases matter most, what causes them, and whether you can overcome them.
January 2023
What Is Behavioral Science: How It Shapes Policy and Products
Behavioral science studies why people act as they do, revealing the gap between rational models and real decisions. Learn how nudge theory shapes policy and product design.
December 2022
What Is the Bandwagon Effect in Finance and Politics
The bandwagon effect explains why people follow the crowd even against their own judgment. Explore its role in markets, elections, and how to resist it.
What Is Strategic Thinking and How to Develop It
Strategic thinking is the ability to analyze complex situations, anticipate the future, and make decisions that create long-term advantage. Learn how to develop it.
What Is the Winner's Curse: Why Winning Auctions Can Lose Money
The winner's curse explains why the highest bidder often overpays. Learn how it affects M&A deals, IPOs, talent bidding wars, and how to avoid it.
October 2022
What Is the Abilene Paradox: When Groups Agree on What No One Wants
The Abilene Paradox happens when groups collectively agree on an action that no individual actually wants. Learn the psychology, causes, and how to prevent it.
What Is Game Theory: How Strategic Thinking Works
Game theory explains strategic decision-making when outcomes depend on others' choices. Learn Nash equilibrium, prisoner's dilemma, and real-world applications.
September 2022
What Is Asymmetric Information: When One Side Knows More
Asymmetric information occurs when one party in a transaction knows more than the other. Learn Akerlof's lemons market, adverse selection, moral hazard, and signaling theory.
August 2022
What Is the Paradox of Choice: When More Options Make Us Worse Off
The paradox of choice argues more options lead to worse decisions and less satisfaction. Learn Schwartz's jam study, replication issues, and when choice helps vs hurts.
What Is the Mere Measurement Effect: Why Being Asked Changes Behavior
The mere measurement effect shows that simply asking about intentions changes future behavior. Learn the research, mechanisms, and real-world applications.
What Is Introspection Illusion: Why We Don't Know Our Own Minds
The introspection illusion reveals that our explanations for our own behavior are often confabulated. Learn the Nisbett and Wilson research and what it means.
What Is the Herd Mentality: Why People Follow the Crowd
Herd mentality explains why people conform to group behavior even against their own judgment. Learn the psychology, research, and real-world examples.
What Is Value Investing: How Warren Buffett Thinks About Stocks
Value investing means buying stocks worth more than their price. Learn Graham's intrinsic value concept, Buffett's adaptations, and whether the value premium still exists.
July 2022
What Is Somatic Intelligence: When Your Body Knows Before Your Brain
Somatic intelligence is the body's capacity to process and communicate information through physical sensation. Learn about Damasio's somatic markers, interoception, and body-based decision-making.
What Is the Availability Heuristic in Healthcare Decisions
The availability heuristic distorts healthcare decisions for patients and doctors alike. Learn how fear of rare diseases drives over-testing and health anxiety.
What Is the Default Effect: Why Pre-Selected Options Win
The default effect shows that pre-selected options are chosen far more often than alternatives. Learn the psychology behind it and its implications for design and policy.