Beware of Experts

OK, this is a tricky thing since I am, myself, an expert in marketing communications. I understand the irony here. But it needs to be said, so I’m planting a flag—beware of experts.

Here’s why: Experts tend to be very attached to the past. Their very expertise lies in the tried-and-true. As such, experts are frequently the least capable of judging and implementing new ideas. They tend to be more comfortable making incremental changes to old ideas, rather than embracing a shifting paradigm. They also tend to explore new ideas in the context of entrenched assumptions, so they often "don't know what they don't know."

The only thing trickier than being an expert of the tried-and-true is being an expert of the untried-and-brand-new. Which brings us to newly minted “social media experts.”

There’s no such thing as a “social media expert.” It’s too new, too big, and changing too rapidly for anyone to know everything about all social media. The most knowledgeable people approach it with a “learner’s mind” every single day.

Even highly experienced people with specialized expertise in a specific medium—such as Facebook—work daily to stay on top of it. These people are rare, and if you make a strategic decision to be on Facebook, for example, you should definitely hire them to maximize your presence on Facebook. But don’t expect them to be equally expert in Twitter, Ning or LinkedIn.

And last, but not least:  No expert is a one-size-fits-all solution. No one—including me—is right for every project and every company. Expertise aside, there are many intangibles that make someone a good fit with your company’s culture and its goals. At the end of the day, your own instincts outweigh anyone else’s “expertise.”

 Ciao for now!

 ________________________

Photo credit: “is Social Media Expert” by Martin Ringlein via Flickr, used under a Creative Commons license.

Let's Twitter: @WanderNot