Some years ago I led the public relations launch of a next-generation “bet your company” software platform for my employer at the time. The product promised to transform an industry and ensure the business retained its star status. Those of us charged with the product marketing did a fabulous job of storytelling. We had the national trade media eating out of our palms, giving us positive, prominent coverage in one publication after another.

But there was one small problem: Our firm never delivered the product — at least not nearly as advertised.

We had sold an incredible story, not an incredible product.

Today, I am looking back at that experience through the lens of one of the most provocative books I have read in years: “Thinking, Fast and Slow” by Daniel Kahneman, winner of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. Kahneman is actually a psychologist but his work around decision making challenged the prevailing rational model of judgment in economics. He is professor emeritus at Princeton University. (more…)