“I do not think that I know what I do not know.” Socrates
said that. The great Greek philosopher does not normally
feature in any of those greatest management gurus of alltime
lists, but maybe he should.
I also like his observation, during the trial that ended in
his death: “I don’t know whether you have been convinced by
my accusers. I myself was almost carried away by them, their
arguments were so persuasive and yet hardly a word of what
they said was true.” I’ve felt that exact same thing many a
time when listening to suppliers and, by a second-hand route,
hearing what rivals have said about Mole Graphics and about
their own capabilities.
The most egregious example of the latter is probably the
sales director of a print services provider who almost won a
major pan-European job by insisting that his company owned
proprietary software which automatically translated text from
one language to another. That might – in the age of Google
Translate – be plausible today but in 1987 the claim was
downright outlandish. Luckily, at the last minute, the client
asked to test this amazing capability and, after a plethora of
excuses from our competitor, gave us the job.
I don’t want you to think I spend all my down time
reading Socrates. I picked up the book – Bettany Hughes’
‘The Hemlock Cup’ – at a train station secondhand
bookstore before a long journey and was soon engrossed.
(Full disclosure: the train WiFi was so erratic I had nothing
else to entertain myself with, apart from the latest finance
department spreadsheets.)
One of Socrates’ accusers blamed him for misleading
his son – encouraging him to ‘think’ rather than
automatically accept his lot as the heir to the family
business. As the patriarch – and I use the word satirically –
of Mole Graphics, I understand why this would be irritating.
On the other hand, I have seen too many demotivated
son-and-heirs running print companies out of a sense of
familial obligation. In such cases, a pre-emptive chat from
Socrates might have spared the son anguish and helped
the business.
And if everybody agreed not to pretend to know stuff
they didn’t know, business life would be so much more
productive. So I raise my glass to Socrates – trusting that
there is no hemlock in it!
