I won’t insult this book’s author by linking to its amazon page/image. It is a great read. In fact, all Mikes books are great, I have read (or listened) to each of them over the years; Design is a Job & You’re my favourite client.
I only disagreed with one opinion, but, I strongly disagreed. I stopped short of tweeting at the time, as I loved the rest of the book so much, but these lines never sat easy with me
Humility is just lipstick on a pig called fear…
Mike Monterio
…Humility is a trait we simply don’t have the luxury of entertaining.
Nah.
To pop the quotes in context, if we are too fearful of speaking up or out then we are doing ourselves and those we represent a dis-service. It made me think of when I was on a management course and they pointed out those who were in ‘the servant leader’ gang can do their teams wrong by not being bold enough.
In both cases, I am inclined to disagree. I don’t agree humility equals fear and that being the case I don’t agree it is a luxury. I think of humility more like modesty. If someone else wants to highlight something excellent I have accomplished, ace, their voice will be heard more loudly than me bragging about my own success. I can recognise when others have drawn attention to my better work and I realise the value in doing the same for others. I make no pause or objection in highlighting good work being done by others.
Monterio does go on to condemn cockiness, which I do agree with, so we are not totally on different pages.
This aside, the rest of the book is awesome. It also introduced me to the work of Victor Papanek which is the gift that keeps giving.