The late, great Peter Drucker once remarked that people who call themselves “gurus” do so because they can’t spell “charlatan.”
Vistage speaker Don Schminkce suggests you be aware of one symptom of what he calls “Charlatitis: An inflammatory condition that infects ordinary people causing them to believe they possess genuine knowledge.
To wit: the “Butterfly Effect”. This was a concept from meteorology that small changes in a system could have dramatic effect on larger systems: e.g. a butterfly’s wings ultimately creating a hurricane. Yet, consultants from many disciplines have borrowed the concept for uses it was never intended often with unintended consequences.
Mr. Schmincke’s article Myth Busted! The Butterfly Effect deserve a few moments of your time if you’d like to avoid this error.
