Reds pay for wishful thinking

The recent book on judgment and decision-making, Thinking, Fast and Slow, by the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, should be required reading for the people who run football clubs.

Kahneman has a lot to teach them about optimism and the pitfalls of wishful thinking. When people decide they want to do something, they are very good at ignoring all the things that could go wrong. Most small businesses fail, but most small business owners believe their business will succeed. Planners usually underestimate how long a project will take to complete, and how much it will cost.

Kahneman describes a proposal by the psychologist Gary Klein, aimed at helping organisations that are about to make an important decision to reduce the likelihood of stumbling into a major mistake.