I'm Ilias Ennajmi, based in Casablanca.
By day I work in marketing strategy, which mostly means figuring out how to make people want things and then getting out of the way. The whole job rests on a slightly uncomfortable idea: most decisions get made for us well before we think we're making them.
That idea is also the thing I can't stop writing about. Ulysses is where I take the slow road: psychology, behavior, philosophy, the question of why people act at all. Ilias is the louder half: marketing and strategy, who profits when they do. Same machine, looked at from both ends.
This site is where the two argue with each other in public. There's no course at the end of it and no five-step framework. Just the writing.
See how this has changed
Nothing archived yet. This is the first version. Older ones show up here once the list above changes.
Most choices get settled by whatever didn't need choosing. Understand the defaults and you understand most of the behavior.
Every nudge has someone on the other end who benefits. Asking who isn't cynical. It's just reading the incentives.
I don’t write things I’ve concluded; I write to figure out what I think. If a piece doesn’t surprise me halfway through, it isn’t finished.
I would rather publish less and mean it. Nothing here runs on a schedule.
Say hello.
For work, arguments, or book recommendations.
I also take on strategy work, if the incentives line up. Say so in the subject line and skip the deck.
