Barry Nalebuff TOPICS: Economics Management Business Future Technology Strategic Planning FEE CATEGORY:* 20.0k to 25.0k TRAVELS FROM: Connecticut Video Profile Books & Videos Request This Speaker

Barry Nalebuff: Books & Videos

Thinking Strategically

Most books on game theory either focus on specialized applications (cardplaying, business, nuclear war) or bore with mathematics and jargon. Free of formulas and argot, this refreshing exception distills the principles, concepts, tools and techniques--brinkmanship, bargaining, unconditional moves, vicious circles, etc.--with an astonishing diversity of illustrative examples drawn from political campaigns, baseball, neighborhood dynamics of segregation, the military draft, speed limits, childrearing and so forth. In helping strategists anticipate rivals' responses and win the game, economics professors Dixit and Nalebuff (who teach game theory at Princeton and Yale, respectively) provide managers, negotiators, athletes, parents and other game-players with a formidable weapon.

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Why Not?

The notion that innovation can be "routinized" is a perennial theme of business theorists. This engaging primer is more insightful than the usual free-associational, brainstorming protocols.

Economist Nalebuff and law professor Ayres insist that "innovation is a skill that can be taught," and distill it into a few rules of thumb, like "where else would it work?" (putting airline data recorders into cars, for example) and "would flipping it work?", which involves gonzo conceptual inversions like students raising their hands to not be called on or "reverse 900 numbers" where telemarketers pay people to accept calls.

Leavened with a little economics, game theory, psychology and contract law, the authors' framework furnishes useful heuristics to analyze a host of problems from auto theft to campaign finance reform. The result is an interesting compendium of market-oriented socioeconomic fixes, some intriguing (having HMOs sell their members life insurance as an incentive to keep them alive), and a few improbable (offering Palestinians stock in Israeli companies in exchange for a peace settlement).

Their system does not, alas, always live up to its billing as an assembly line for business innovations. Many of the ideas they showcase are culled from other sources, and many, like having video renters rewind before-not after-they watch the tape, amount to trivial wrinkles on established practice.

The dream of reducing creativity to a set of automatic procedures, shorn of expertise, trial-and-error, eureka moments and plain old hardthinking remains elusive, but the authors seem to know it when they see it.

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