Alchemy

The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense

By: Rory Sutherland

Narrated by: Rory Sutherland

Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

Random House presents the audiobook edition of Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense, written by Rory Sutherland.

To be brilliant, you have to be irrational.

Why is Red Bull so popular - even though everyone hates the taste? Why do countdown boards on platforms take away the pain of train delays? And why do we prefer stripy toothpaste?

We think we are rational creatures. Economics and business rely on the assumption that we make logical decisions based on evidence.

But we aren’t, and we don’t.

In many crucial areas of our lives, reason plays a vanishingly small part. Instead we are driven by unconscious desires, which is why placebos are so powerful. We are drawn to the beautiful, the extravagant and the absurd - from lavish wedding invitations to tiny bottles of the latest fragrance. So if you want to influence people’s choices you have to bypass reason. The best ideas don’t make rational sense: they make you feel more than they make you think.

Rory Sutherland is the Ogilvy advertising legend whose TED Talks have been viewed nearly seven million times. In his first book he blends cutting-edge behavioural science, jaw-dropping stories and a touch of branding magic on his mission to turn us all into idea alchemists.

©2019 Rory Sutherland (P)2019 Random House Audiobooks

Amazing insight

What people say and what they actually do are different. This is one book you can’t even read with speed of 1x, you got to make it less than that to imbibe the concepts and insights. Really amazing work.

Amazing

The Author is such a different thinker; I thoroughly enjoyed every minute. My mind is more open now

Edutainment at its best

Enjoyable and insightful. A great plus that it is read by the author. Sometimes that’s a bad idea, but for this book it’s brilliant.

perhaps the only way to solve, the unsolvable

Perhaps it's time to admit logic is great, BUT it's really not how we make decisions (and I started programming in basic at 12) we tried the logical and look where that's getting us.

Time is running out for our kids

and we are sitting around discussing numbers

Perhaps reframing could solve some of our biggest global problems and allow us to actually start getting the planet fixed before we can't breathe the air.

Loved the ideas and have used many when the math just was not enough, many times, in the last twenty years as I was looking for solutions not a pat on the back.

People's livelihoods were at stake. Now it's our Kids lives we are deciding because we cannot see, past our own supieor intellects as the master of our minds.

Shame we value powerful ideas only when they appear logical, fact is, it's not the logical brain that gives us deep insight

and soon with AI this type of thinking is the only thing that will have any meaning and we hammer it out of most of our kids

Great book good stories

Consider the ideas, they have saved the companies I have worked for and with millions

And when the reward saves families and pays paychecks? Why not?

Take a challenge, try one suggestion it, may just save, your skin, your business, your friend or loved one, or we keep doing the same and we all know which ward that may lead to......

My nigga Rory Sutherland

the great rory is back with a banger of a book about marketing alchemy. what's not to love?

great listen, great ideas

After I've seen Rory talk at a small conference many years ago, I have been a fan of his way of thinking. As a digital product manager, some new ideas opened up to me; I feel inspired to try things that are more alchemy than science.

The author’s reading brings life to a great book.

I’d recommend this book. Many illuminating gems, well written. Perhaps some chapters could be shorter,

Simply incredible

I read a lot of business psychology books and this may be my favourite. All I can say is that when I get older I hope to be Rory.

Simply stunning - by the horse whisperers horse whisperer!

I first met Rory back in 2010, I think at the in house bar at Ogilvy Canary Wharf, when I’d been gifted the use of offices there to work on a project to create a sustainable development bank... Since then I have had the privilege to meet this giant of a thinker from time to time to discuss the merits and methods of changing the world using financial innovation and behavioural psychology. In Alchemy, Rory distills the thinking that many will have been wowed by in his highly successful Ted or other talks, and illuminates how the forces that drive our world and our lives are so rarely the result of chance - but rather the subtle nudges of those who have something in mind for us. Like the skilled shepherd whistling his dog, or the horse whisperer communicating in ways so subtle they are barely perceptible, Rory’s insights help one see what is behind the minds, tools and techniques of those pulling our strings - giving us mere mortals at least a chance of resisting or pulling a string or two of our own!!! Highly recommended.

So good, that I immediately stated listening again.

I’m at usually very harsh with these types of books.
They usually have an unhealthy combination of wild conjecture and painfully obvious. Adding up to nothing useful.

Original observations, good research, engagingly written.
The title is a bit lame. So recommending it to friends is going to be difficult.

Good man, good book.