I've been Blinking

I started reading Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking for the first time today. I know, I know... I'm way behind the 8 ball on this whole reading thing. That's alright, it just means that I'm discovering all the great nuggets of insight for the first time while the best thing most others can have is the re-read. I've done the re-read many times. I'm big on the re-read. But I decided it was time to start reading some new works, so it's off Dale Carnegie and on to others. This week, Malcolm Gladwell.

I'm just scraping the surface as I've only made it to chapter 3, but so far I've found some really interesting nuggets of knowledge. It is amazing how accurate some of our first blush reactions to something are. It seems that popular wisdom has us suppressing these natural capabilities. So many times at work I think that something isn't exactly as it should be, whether it's a product feature or a decision that is being made. But I find myself suppressing those thoughts, instead looking to back any such "irrational thinking" with hard data.

3 months and $20,000 from my marketing budget later, I often find myself with the same answer I had arrived at in that first moment. I'm sure it can be hit or miss, but I appreciate how the book is pointing out that sometimes when people garner a wealth of expertise in a subject, they actually become much better equipped for a snap judgement. It essentially becomes a "safe bet" for those individuals.

Being able to quickly size up a situation, in this case, is something that should be cherished, not necessarily disparaged. We'll see if there's a "but" coming... there usually always is.