The Strength and Safety in Numbers
In 1962, a young advertising executive named David Ogilvy wrote something that would haunt the industry for decades: “The consumer isn’t a moron; she is your wife.”
It was a radical idea at the time. Madison Avenue was built on the assumption that people were easily manipulated, that clever tricks and psychological pressure were the keys to persuasion. Ogilvy suggested something different: respect your audience’s intelligence.
He was laughed out of more than a few rooms.
I think about Ogilvy every time I hear the latest buzzwords making their rounds among the tech founders. “Vibe coding.” “Clarity is kindness.” “High-agency employees.” “Forward Deployed Engineers.” These phrases spread through our industry like a game of telephone, each repetition making them more sacred and less meaningful.
There’s safety in speaking the language everyone else speaks. There’s comfort in using the frameworks everyone else uses. There’s a particular kind of professional warmth that comes from nodding along when someone mentions “making a dent in the universe” for the thousandth time (Why?? It is perfectly shapeless as is).
But there’s also a cost. The cost of optimizing for recognition instead of results. For validation instead of honesty. The cost of building what everyone expects instead of what actually works.
I learned this the hard way a few months ago, sitting in a room full of executives discussing “AI-first strategy.” Same promises. Same fundamental misunderstanding of what customers actually need. I wanted to say something, but I knew what would happen. The polite nods. The uncomfortable silence. The subtle shift that yells, “Why is he being defensive?”
This is the tax you pay for seeing things differently. Not the dramatic loneliness of the misunderstood, but something quieter and more persistent. The slow realization that the conversations everyone else is having aren’t the conversations that matter.
Twenty-five years in tech has taught me that every breakthrough starts with someone willing to be wrong in public. The founder who insisted on mobile-first when desktop was king. The engineer who championed microservices when monoliths were gospel. The GTM leader who bet on product-led growth when sales-led was the only safe way.
They all shared one trait: they were comfortable being the only person in the room doing and saying what no one else would.
But here’s the thing — the hardest part isn’t having the contrarian idea. It’s living with it when everyone else thinks you’re wrong. It’s continuing to build when others doesn’t understand. It’s explaining your vision for the hundredth time to someone who just doesn’t get it.
But sometimes — not often, but sometimes — you turn around and realize you’re not alone anymore. That the path you’ve been clearing has become a road for a few others.
Ogilvy was right about respecting intelligence. But he was also right about something else: “In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative, original thinker unless you can also sell what you create.”
The question isn’t whether you’re brave enough to be different. It’s whether you’re patient enough to be right, and compelling enough to sell.
Marketing is broken. It is the most misunderstood, abused and misused part of most companies. This is the uncomfortable truth.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. It is solvable. The is my new mission. This is what keeps me up at night.
