It’s Not Always Relative

It’s Not Always Relative

I once had to yell at 20 very powerful newspaper publishers in a strategy retreat organized by the American Press Institute that the Holy Grail of the First Amendment did NOT forgive them for sloppy and stupid management. Defending and representing freedom of speech does not, concomitantly, give you leave to abuse your employees or take advantage of your advertisers.

Similarly, I’ve seen irrelevant defenses among professionals akin to the non sequitur of “If the economy is rebounding, why didn’t the Cleveland Cavaliers make the finals?”

One person told me that his extraordinarily annoying propensity to turn a simple question into a verbose and prolix hour’s debate was “who he was,” and represented his uniqueness in life. No, not really, it represents a self-absorbed aberration. These statements are often accompanied by the pseudo-relativism of, “It’s all in the eye of the beholder.” Not quite true, because the habit of picking up your steak with your fingers is an abomination, in anyone’s eyes in any restaurant, unless you have only four fingers and you bark. There are empirical slobs.

“There is more than one way to do this” is another rubric, which is true about getting cross-town in New York, but not about extracting a tooth or wearing a seat belt. “There is often not more than one correct or effective way to do this” might be a more accurate statement. You can say “form’ id a ble,” or you can say “for mid’ a ble.” Of course, you can say the second if you prefer to be incorrect, so there is more than one way, just not the right way. (You imply when you speak, infer when you listen; prone is on your stomach, supine is on you back. You can interchange them, but you wouldn’t be correct.)

“There is more than one way to bill a client,” said a pompous consultant at a pretentious meeting, “and I can earn more billing by the hour than by charging for value.” Well, yes you can, IF you extend the hours way beyond what the client actually needs and/or you simply don’t understand value based billing and do it incorrectly. But, hey, I’m not responsible for your retirement fund, so keep those six-minute billing increments coming.

In a social media age, we can often live under the delusion that anything anyone says is a valid point. But the art and science of educating yourself involves judiciously deciding to whom to listen, and not pompously proclaiming that you’re as smart as the next person, despite the other’s higher levels of expertise, experience, and education.

To be a thought leader, you need more than thoughts.

© Alan Weiss 2010. All rights reserved.