Black Box Thinking

Paperback / ISBN-13: 9781399830379

Price: £12.99

ON SALE: 25th September 2025

Genre: Business Strategy / Popular Psychology / Sports Psychology

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10th ANNIVERSARY EDITION OF THE SUNDAY TIMES NO.1 BESTSELLER

‘Will transform your entire perspective’ THE TIMES


‘A stirring call to revolutionise how we think about success’ DANIEL PINK, author of DRIVE

‘Brilliant’ JAMES DYSON

What is the secret to success? Black Box Thinking.

Ten years on from its original publication, Black Box Thinking remains a game-changing manifesto for success.

In this special anniversary edition – featuring brand new material from Matthew Syed – his bold thesis that failure, far from being something to fear, is the secret to innovation and improvement feels more urgent than ever.

Packed with gripping case studies, eye-opening research, and stories from elite sport, cutting-edge medicine, aviation, business, and beyond, Syed shows how the most progressive individuals and organizations treat mistakes not as threats, but as tools for growth.

This is a book for anyone striving to do better. It will change how you think about failure – and show you how to turn it into success.

‘Highly persuasive’ DAILY MAIL

‘It highlights the need for a growth mindset in life’ RICHARD BRANSON

‘A book that dares us to do better’ HOWARD JACOBSON

Reviews

Creative breakthroughs always begin with multiple failures. This brilliant book shows how true invention lies in the understanding and overcoming of these failures, which we must learn to embrace
JAMES DYSON, DESIGNER, INVENTOR & ENTREPRENEUR
Matthew Syed has issued a stirring call to revolutionise how we think about success -- by changing our attitude to failure. Failure shouldn't be shameful and stigmatising, but exciting and enlightening. Full of well-crafted stories and keenly deployed scientific insights, BLACK BOX THINKING will forever change the way you think about screwing up
DANIEL PINK, AUTHOR OF DRIVE & TO SELL IS HUMAN
Retrieval was Matthew Syed's forte when he was England's number one table tennis player. You couldn't get anything past him. And retrieval is the subject of this extraordinarily wide-ranging book. Retrieval of hope, retrieval of experience - not just a true sportsman's determination to retrieve success from the lessons of failure, but a true humanitarian's too. A book that dares us to do better
HOWARD JACOBSON, WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE
An extraordinary, inspirational book which reveals how great performers and teams are driven by an insatiable curiosity for marginal gains, together with the intellectual courage to challenge their most cherished assumptions
DAVE BRAILSFORD, GENERAL MANAGER, TEAM SKY