Here’s an example of the phenomenon in action. I worked for a nonprofit media company that was in a tough financial spot. An angel swept in and made all the troubles go away. That afternoon, the top newsman at the company got up to address us. “This doesn’t mean you’re all going to get Blackberry’s,” he said. Instead, we hired consultants to tell us what to do with our windfall, and we managers spent with them many hours—many painful hours, days upon days, all of them in rooms filled with people being paid huge sums per hour—we could have better spent doing journalism.

Months later, the consultants gave us our results at a company meeting. Suggestion number one: The staff should get Blackberry’s. That’s a true story.