In business, every big decision is a bet on the future. Are you making the smartest bets?

Too often, business leaders mistake luck for skill—celebrating wins without questioning the decision-making process or blaming individuals for losses that were simply out of their control. In today’s uncertain business environment, where labor shortages, economic shifts, and rapid technological advancements create volatility, making smarter bets is more important than ever.

That’s why we are so excited to bring you Annie Duke—bestselling author, decision strategist, and former professional poker champion—for an insightful and dynamic mainstage conversation at the Great Game of Business Conference. In this engaging discussion, Annie will dive into the high-stakes world of decision-making, sharing how business leaders can improve their strategic bets—even when they don’t have all the facts.

Annie’s best-selling book, Thinking in Bets, has become a must-read for business leaders, challenging conventional thinking about risk, uncertainty, and decision-making. In fact, Jack Stack was so inspired by this book that he and Darren Dahl shared a blog post last year.

At the conference, she’ll explore:

• Why “resulting”—judging decisions based on outcomes rather than the process—is a dangerous trap in business.
• How to separate luck from skill when making big strategic bets.
• How to build a decision-making framework based on probabilities, data, and long-term thinking—not gut feelings and emotions.
• How the best poker players (and business leaders) embrace uncertainty and use it to their advantage.

If you’ve ever made a business decision and later wondered, Was that smart, or did I just get lucky?, you won’t want to miss this conversation.

ABOUT ANNIE DUKE

Annie is passionate about understanding how we make decisions in complex, unpredictable situations. Her latest obsession? The power of quitting. She’s on a mission to redefine quitting—not as failure, but as a strategic move that allows us to focus on better opportunities.

Annie is an author, speaker, and consultant in the decision-making space, as well as Special Partner focused on Decision Science at First Round Capital Partners, a seed-stage venture fund. Her latest book, Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away, was released in 2022, following her national bestseller, Thinking in Bets.

As a former professional poker player, she has won more than $4 million in tournament poker, earned a World Series of Poker bracelet, and remains the only woman to have won both the WSOP Tournament of Champions and the NBC National Poker Heads-Up Championship. She retired from the game in 2012.

Before her poker career, Annie was awarded a National Science Foundation Fellowship to study Cognitive Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, where she earned her master’s degree. She returned to Penn in 2021 as a Visiting Scholar, where she also teaches executive education, and in 2023, she completed her PhD in Cognitive Psychology.

Beyond her work in business and academia, Annie is the co-founder of The Alliance for Decision Education, a nonprofit dedicated to improving lives through decision skills education. She also serves on the National Board of After-School All-Stars, the Board of Directors of the Franklin Institute, and the board of the Renew Democracy Initiative.

Don’t Leave Your Business Success to Chance

Join us for this exclusive mainstage conversation with Annie Duke, where you’ll gain insights that will forever change how you think about risk, strategy, and decision-making.