On the flip side, reading a puff piece in the NYTimes about chaos theory doesn’t mean I really understand it.

Granted, we can find reveresed examples. Much of Darwin’s thought was influenced by Thomas Malthus. New ideas in A.I. come from all over the place, including fields as broad as biology, neuroscience, computer science, electrical engineering, robotics, linguistics, philosophy and psychology.

I agree that horizontal connections are important. They are the basis of creativity. But there is difference between knowing about something and understanding something.

It seems to me (and this is admittedly, purely anecdotal) that people tend to skim lots of sources and then mention them in passing as if they know what they are talking about. They are trying to sound smart.

On the flip side, I think there are lots of people in this world that never dig in and understand anything – not one single idea – on a decent level of depth. I equate it to reading music. At first you sit and think about the notes. Then you start to recognize some patterns. A ‘C’ maps directly to a finger position instead of having that intermediate ‘oh that’s a C’ step. Then one day you don’t even think about what chord it is, you just play. I think people can do this in business too. You start to *feel* things, not in an emotional sense but in a know-it-like-the-back-of-your-hand sense.

I’m not disagreeing that breadth is important. I just think most people fall into your description of “throwing out half understood terms.”

What prompted the post is that people no longer seem to see the value of digging deep into an area of knowledge, and I think that still has tremendous value. Depth is being ignored in exchange for ever shallower breadth.

My favorite quote about business decisions is that “you need to be widely informed and need to think straight. There are no exotic models or magic formulas you can depend on.”

But in my experience no one person can be informed widely enough nor can they consistantly think straight.

Therefore great business decisions takes a “team” with the right people all willing to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate. It’s kind of a wisdom of crowds thing without “the ignorant and the crazy.”

And a second comment: We do not commonly consider experts to have wisdom either. Experts have and provide educated, in-depth knowledge in niche areas. Wisdom is something else again.

And it’s not a new tool either. Leadership (and that means commercial leadership too) has been defined as “finding a parade and getting in front” for centuries.

David,
Great points.