All of us have been taught to believe that having the right expertise is essential to our personal and business success. We see in-depth knowledge as the foundation of progress, and highly trained experts as rock stars capable of solving the world’s most pressing challenges and creating the world’s most compelling new products, services, business ventures, and ideas. We worry about looking stupid in school, at work, or in social settings, and dream of being the “smartest person in the room” as the golden ticket to career growth, popularity, and making remarkable things happen.
But what if having a high level of expertise is vastly overrated, or even detrimental to our success? What if being ignorant, or at least having very little knowledge about the topic at hand, is often a much more useful asset in our quest to create breakthroughs?
Examples abound. Think about Orville and Wilbur Wright, two now-famous brothers who knew very little about how to fly beyond paying close attention to birds and other flying creatures, reading science fiction, making paper airplanes, and wondering. Yet they were able to turn their curiosity, love of learning, hard work, ingenuity, and skill as bicycle mechanics into an aircraft that would launch the aviation industry.
Or the founders of Airbnb. They knew very little about the hotel industry beyond what they had learned from their own travels. Yet they were able to turn their difficulty in finding an affordable place to stay, the need for extra cash, a free sofa, a bit of technology, and the emergence of the sharing economy into the world’s largest “hospitality” company. It would quickly become a compelling alternative to hotels and one that none of the experts at Marriott, Hilton, Hyatt, or any of the world’s other leading hotel companies ever envisioned.
Or Martine Rothblatt, a renowned telecommunications entrepreneur and expert who changed fields in the middle of a remarkably successful career to find a cure for her daughter’s seemingly incurable respiratory disease. She knew very little about lungs, medicine, or drug development but combined the greatest sense of urgency with a special gift for building connections, solving problems, growing businesses, and making things happen. In the process she would create United Therapeutics, a leading biotech firm, bringing to market a abandoned compound that experts had discarded.
Was it great expertise or the right amount of ignorance that drove each of their breakthroughs?
Think about the “state-of-the-art” in your field or industry. Then think about what it will take to move your work forward. Is it a high level of expertise or the ability to take a fresh look? The answer might surprise you.
There are, of course, situations when having the right expertise and experience are essential. But they are becoming less common every day. In a world changing super-fast, not knowing stuff and having an open mind is way more essential to making a difference in the things that matter most.
We win in business and in life when we realize that our expertise might not carry the day!
