Lots of entrepreneurs spend a lot of time telling investors they are the only ones who can do this or that particular thing. While other entrepreneurs explain how their method or model is better than all of the other methods or models. Polite investors just sit back and hold their tongues as they recount how many entrepreneurs they personally know doing the same exact thing. Even if you think you are the only company who can do whatever you are doing, don’t tell anyone. Humility is a virtue that can help instill confidence. Of course startups aren’t the only ones guilty of hubris or condescension. Yesterday Mike Elgan asked “Why is Google so condescending?” explaining that Google spent the last week telling us just how backward we are. Some of the quotes were simply unbelievable:
Google’s Gabriel Stricker, director of Global Communications and Public Affairs, said that the reason Google holds events like this one was that “we hear from a lot of you that with the kind of breakneck pace of innovation that we go through at Google, it’s nice for us to kind of let you catch your breath.” He went on to tell the audience that they would “hear from our Search rocket scientists in a second who will hold your hand through the latest and greatest of what we’re up to.”
I share Mike’s sentiments when he notes, “So Google is so awesome that the company has to pause so the rest of the world can catch its breath? And we’re all so stupid that Google geniuses have to “hold our hands” as they explain things?”
Mike noted that the hubris isn’t confined to Google’s PR team, “Come to think of it, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt often comes across as arrogant and condescending. He recently asserted that Google users actually “want Google to tell them what they should be doing next.” Responding to a question about Google’s ever-increasing invasion of privacy for profit, Schmidt said: “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”
Google should be very concerned. Unlike an investor, users tend not to sit back on hold their tongues. Companies that talk down to their users for very long tend to lose them fairly quickly. Don’t make the same mistake.
