There seems to be a trend towards people gaining from “the wisdom of crowds” at the moment. While I certainly appreciate the advice and inputs of people who really care about me and about what I do and stand for, I am not too concerned about what the majority of people think or say. Many look to what “the majority” are thinking, saying and doing to in order to “benchmark” their own views and actions. I don’t. If I benchmark at all, I do so against universal, non-negotiable principles. While there certainly is wisdom in crowds, you’d have to sift through tons of worthless dirt to get at the “nuggets”, and it’s a really huge undertaking doing so. I’d much rather cast my net where I know the fish will be. Or take readings on sonar and conduct spectra analysis to determine the size, shape and spatial orientation of buried oil deposits before drilling.

There are such things as common law and common sense. They ARE common. What is NOT common are their application and usage. How about in your company, are they more than occasional sightings? Stand fast by them, and benchmark your strategy, operations and other processes by universal principles. Once you start application, you will be faced with what appear to be easy and hard decisions. A rule of thumb is to always go for the hard decisions. Yes, feel with your heart but decide with your head.

By the way, does anyone reading this know who “they” are? Or who “the majority” are? Or who exactly it was who did “the research”, and how they got their results?