So recently a couple of us got interviewed by Wired magazine about our views of China however what we found more interesting was interviewing the journo [from the UK, but based in SF] about his views of the place.
To be fair, he had only just arrived and openly acknowledged his perspective was based on only about a weeks worth of exposure to the country … but despite that, he rattled off a lot of facts, figures and views that sounded very similar to the sorts of business books that claim to give real insight into this unique country.
In other words, it was a perspective that was one dimensional, driven by fear and – quite often – just plain wrong.
Being a good journo, he knew this was the case which is why he said he needed/wanted greater exposure to what was going on so he could make a much more informed view … but the fact is, there’s a lot of people out there – a lot of business people – who are quite happy to read a book and then think they know all that’s going on, even though if the situation was reversed, they’d think it corporate suicide.
Too many people think they are smarter than the next.
They think their talent and brainpower can bypass years of training, experience and exposure and somehow pull off a feat where thousands have failed before them.
Adland is littered with them … and planners are often the worst.
We talk like we are fonts of all knowledge and yet in terms of real exposure to real situations, we often haven’t even taken the stabilizers off our bikes of life.
The best thing I ever did was start a company.
Actually quite a few.
Some were nothing but unmitigated disasters but others – like cynic – ended up being quite special indeed.
One of the main reasons for that was that we went for breadth of knowledge, not just depth.
We were – and are – huge believers in getting multiple perspectives on the same issue because whilst we knew one extreme view was as potentially flawed as the counter extreme view … it opened our eyes to bigger issues, decisions and opportunities and by doing that, we were not only better informed, but were able to develop work that had the potential to have real relevance to a greater amount of people.
Planners, bloggers and businessmen have to be careful not to surround themselves with people who only share their same view, because if you do that, you can end up like many of the Western companies who’ve come to Asia … deluded, confused and broke.