Counterpoint: smart, interested, thoughtful people want to hear your ideas. Judging their judgment in advance, assuming they’ll all be swayed by brashness and

Counterpoint: smart, interested, thoughtful people want to hear your ideas. Judging their judgment in advance, assuming they’ll all be swayed by brashness and unsupportable claims, is really to discount their intelligence. A failure to reach them, to inform your peers, to share and collaborate on ideas due to misplaced humility, to expect someone to entirely bear the responsibility of seeking us out, is almost equally arrogant as the brash salesman. You can compete with the dishonest. Just because many liars are sellers, doesn’t mean all marketing is lying.