We don't use astrology in hiring, yet we search for the root cause in our postmortems. We don't hammer screws into wood, yet we bring the same code review process to a new company that we utilized at a previous job. We don’t rely on fortune cookie predictions for new feature success, yet we sometimes treat engineers’ estimates as exact timelines.

These are just a few examples of numerous cognitive biases and mental sets and magical thinking that negatively affect our decision-making and work efficiency.

In this talk, I present a rational approach to work that allows us to recognize where intuition and "common sense" fail us, act more rationally, make optimal decisions, and work happier.

preferred duration: 30 minutes
target audience: IT folks, from managers to engineers