Annie Duke was a former professional poker player. With this debut book, she offers her insights on decision-making and handling uncertainty. That is her main point - differentiating decisions and outcomes. A good decision can result in a bad outcome (the Seahawks throwing the ball at the goal line near the end of the Super Bowl only to be intercepted), while a bad decision can result in a good outcome (driving home safely after too many drinks). Uncertainty is present in many decisions and sometimes luck is the difference. That is certainly the case in poker.
I figured this book would be right up my alley - business, poker, decision-making, risks, uncertainty, probability. It hits on a lot of my interests. Unfortunately, I found the book full of fluff, repeated examples, and little new research. Her writing style is very wordy...I thought her points could be summarized much quicker, maybe better suited on a blog. Many of the sources she referenced were books I already read (acknowledging I read a lot on this topic). I will say her examples are current, although she repeats them too often in the book. I do not mean to be so negative, as I found the "wanna bet" exercise insightful and the last two chapters of the book were solid.
If you have not read anything on decision-making, how brains think, and/or risk & uncertainty, then this is a good book to get you up to speed. But frankly this book is getting a huge lift because of who the author is.
My rating for Thinking in Bets: 2 stars out of 5. Get it here!
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