We assume that good-looking people are smarter and more effective than they really are, and that homely people are the reverse.

In the days when corporate downsizing was all the rage, Wall Street took a lot of flak for judging companies too harshly and setting the bar for corporate performance so high that executives felt their only option was to slash payrolls.

The essence of procrastination lies in not doing what you think you should be doing, a mental contortion that surely accounts for the great psychic toll the habit takes on people. This is the perplexing thing about procrastination: although it seems to involve avoiding unpleasant tasks, indulging in it generally doesn't make people happy.

Traditionally, tours were a means of promoting a record. Today, the record promotes the tour.

Framing effects can be very influential, and to the degree that you can think of a task as close rather than distant, you're more likely to actually get it done.

We assume that good-looking people are smarter and more effective than they really are, and that homely people are the reverse.

In order to work well, markets need a basic level of trust.