#449 Are Strong Opinions Dangerous? - Article by Niels Brabandt
Are Strong Opinions Dangerous?
By Niels Brabandt
In today’s business world, strong opinions are everywhere. From boardrooms to social media, confidence often outpaces competence. But the question is not whether strong opinions are good or bad, it is whether they are helpful or harmful.
As organisations become more complex and information spreads faster than ever, decision-makers must learn to separate conviction backed by expertise from noise amplified by confidence.
The Illusion of Expertise
We live in an age where everyone appears to be an expert. Whether the subject is artificial intelligence, economics, or geopolitics, people make confident statements often supported by little more than a headline or a social media post.
This phenomenon reflects the Dunning-Kruger effect, when limited knowledge produces unjustified confidence. The problem in business settings is clear: when those with little understanding dominate the conversation, those with genuine insight may withdraw. The result is poorer decisions and a culture where volume triumphs over value.
Real expertise requires both education and experience. Academic degrees alone do not make someone an authority. Equally, experience without theoretical understanding leads to repetitive action without reflection. Sustainable competence arises only when both are present.
The Danger of False Balance
In leadership and media alike, we often hear that “both sides deserve to be heard.” While inclusivity is essential, it can easily become what scholars call a false balance.
False balance occurs when valid, evidence-based arguments are presented alongside unfounded opinions, giving the impression that both are equally credible. In organisations, this might mean placing unqualified employees in strategic discussions for the sake of “hearing everyone.” The intention is democratic; the outcome is confusion.
Listening to all perspectives is valuable—but not all perspectives are equally qualified.
A well-run organisation must distinguish between legitimate dissent grounded in evidence and loud opposition rooted in ego.
Freedom of Speech Is Not a Right to a Platform
In modern workplaces, the principle of free speech is often misunderstood. Every individual has the right to hold and express an opinion—but that does not create a right to a platform.
Leaders must ensure that participation in decision-making reflects relevance and competence. A warehouse employee’s view on logistics software, for example, is indispensable because it draws on daily experience. But not every voice should influence strategic or scientific decisions if it lacks the necessary expertise.
Freedom of speech protects expression; it does not guarantee attention.
Evidence, Education, Experience, Eloquence
To evaluate whether a strong opinion deserves weight, decision-makers should apply what I call the Four Es Framework:
Evidence – Is there factual proof supporting the claim?
Education – What intellectual or professional foundation informs the opinion?
Experience – Does the person have practical, real-world exposure to the issue?
Eloquence – Can they communicate their argument clearly and convincingly?
Eloquence, however, must never replace substance. Charismatic communicators without understanding can easily distort organisational priorities. True leadership demands critical listening: rewarding ideas for their merit, not their presentation.
Leadership and the Responsibility of Strong Opinions
Strong opinions are not inherently dangerous. In fact, decisive leaders often need them to inspire direction and confidence. But strong opinions become toxic when they are unexamined—when they replace analysis with assertion.
A leader’s responsibility is twofold:
To encourage strong, evidence-based convictions, and
To filter unqualified noise that masquerades as expertise.
The balance between inclusivity and rigour defines organisational health. When every voice claims equal weight regardless of qualification, leadership dissolves into populism.
A Culture of Thoughtful Conviction
The best organisations do not suppress opinions; they cultivate informed ones. They promote discussion grounded in data, experience, and respectful debate. They reward those who challenge assumptions—but only when those challenges are substantiated.
Strong opinions, when built on evidence, education, and experience, can be powerful catalysts for innovation. Without that foundation, they are simply noise—loud, confident, and ultimately destructive.
About the Author
Niels Brabandt is the Founder and Owner of NB Networks (London | Zurich). He is an international expert on sustainable leadership, organisational culture, and ethical business transformation. His weekly publications—The Leadership Letter, The Leadership Podcast, and The Leadership Videocast—reach a global audience of senior executives and decision-makers.
Website: www.NB-Networks.biz
Niels Brabandt
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More on this topic in this week's videocast and podcast with Niels Brabandt: Videocast / Apple Podcasts / Spotify
For the videocast’s and podcast’s transcript, read below this article.
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Podcast Transcript
Niels Brabandt
And suddenly someone had a strong opinion in the room and everything was solved. Maybe you think this never happened that way and agreed. Usually when a strong opinion occurs, it sometimes contributes towards a good solution, but quite often it is rather aggressive. Quite often it's rather part of the problem. And quite often you often think strong opinion, but not very substantiated. So where do you came up with that stuff? And that's exactly the point we're going to talk about today.
Are strong opinions harmful or even dangerous, or can strong opinions be helpful? And in which context may they arise positively or negatively? Hello and welcome to today's episode. We need to talk about strong opinions because we have more and more strong opinions out there and we need to figure out how to deal with them. And also we need to figure out how to actually deal with them when they happen in everyday business. So when someone suddenly has a strong opinion, what do we do with that? So are strong opinions dangerous or are they just okay?
We live in a world where many people have strong opinions and without sticking to stereotypes, I come from a background of public servants, my family, many teachers are in there. And you know that there are certain stereotypes about teachers. And sometimes these stereotypes from my experience, at least for us, not for all of them, but for certain people, I remember vividly when I spoke to a relative and was talking about one of my clients doing aerospace technology. And I do leadership training there and leadership consultancy, leadership coaching. I'm not in the arrow. I don't create satellites by myself. I don't design them.
I don't engineer them. And quite quickly, the other side told me how easy it is and how anyone can learn that where I was I am very, very surprised how these strong opinions suddenly may arise without any kind of qualification, but it all seems to be oh so easy. And you probably heard that certain groups, for example, teachers or doctors or lawyers, are the ones who quite frequently have strong opinions on many things, often because during their daily business they have quite little friction. Often people do not speak up against them. And then, of course, you think this is how the world goes. I say something and usually I am right with what I say. What is the situation in which we live?
The situation in which we live is that many people have strong opinions, but the question The question is, is this opinion a valid one? And of course, you can always wonder, any opinion is valid. The first thing you have to check here, is there any kind of expertise in the back? Is there any kind of expertise that people can prove? I give you a very simple example of what we have right now. At the moment, anyone is an AI expert.
Anyone is an AI expert. The next sports event, for example, World Cup or the Euro, where people immediately become football for American listeners, soccer experts. When the NFL Super Bowl comes closer, you have football, American football experts all over the planet suddenly. So quite quickly, when people know a tiny bit about something, that's, by the way, called the Dunning-Kruger effect, when people with very, let's say, limited knowledge suddenly think they know a lot and they can make commentary on the matter. I love to watch American football. I do not comment on American football, at least not on the rules or on the players. And you know why?
Because I know that I know the most of the rules, or at least I know most of the basic rules. And that's it. I love to watch it. But as soon as any kind of complicated thing happens, why this kick is that way and how it can touch the ground and who is allowed to touch it and not touch it and whatnot. I don't know. I don't know. I don't watch it often enough for that.
So we have opinions here, but the question is, is there a real expertise? And expertise is based in facts, not just based on an opinion. And unfortunately, quite often people say expertise is the only thing we need, which is not correct. When you, for example, say I have a bachelor's degree, master's degree, doctorate in XYZ, so I'm more qualified on the matter than the other person just doing doing without the degree, that is nothing else than academic arrogance. As someone with an MBA, Executive MBA and a couple of other qualifications, feel free to go on my LinkedIn, check out the tab on education. I think I have to offer quite something there from quite well-known institutions. However, that doesn't make me any kind of better human being automatically.
When someone has all the formal qualifications but no real world experience, it has a certain contribution, but it's not worth as much as they think. If you have no formal qualifications, you only have real-world experience. That is good, but you probably lack the foundation of what you do. You do repetitive tasks, but maybe you don't know why you do them or how you could optimise them. You need both. You need both expertise and the next thing is experience. And as the Brits always say, there is no fast forward for experience.
Probably one of the best phrases I heard in the working world. There is no fast forward for experience. Please keep that in mind, because when we now come to the point that someone in the room has a opinion. We of course need to think, what do I do with this? We can't just ignore them, we can't tell them off. And we especially cannot say it's not valid because you don't have a bachelor's degree, or it's not valid because you don't have real world experience on the matter. We need to find something better than that.
You cannot just simply say quick and very quick solution is in a complex situation, I have an easy answer. That never works out well for anyone. So when we evaluate these situations, the very first thing you have to look for is always Are we victim of the so-called false balance? I give you an example of false balance. Let's say we have a situation, we have a disagreement in the company, or we have a disagreement agreement in the organization. This applies to any organization, if you're for-profit, non-profit, if you are a social company, if you are something which is in the healthcare sector and run by the general public, or based on taxpayers' money, or if you are a for-profit company, privately run by stakeholders and investors all around the globe. When we have the false balance, the false balance means, let's say someone says, I think Oxygen is important for human beings.
You will quite quickly find someone who say, no, no, it's not oxygen, it's just a chemical. There are certain things that the government sprays into the air. This is not oxygen anymore. We are breathing something else to make us more obedient. And somehow some people say we always have to talk with the other side as well. I give you an example. When you say, for example, Is this certain economic situation to be solved with approach A or B?
And you have two people with experience, expertise, formal qualifications, social legitimation, then you can ask them both. But when you, for example, say, yeah, we talk about aerospace today, and we talk about how do we send satellite into the sun to find out whatever we want to find out there. And because we want to have some balance, we're going to ask someone who thinks that the world is flat. Just to have balance. Balance does not mean that anyone who's talking loud and emerges from some sort of social media bubble suddenly becomes a valid commentator on the matter. False balance means that you think just because someone is a polar opposite to what you said, they need to be heard. When someone, for example, says, yeah, we need people who do the work in this country.
So I still think we shouldn't have foreigners here because foreigners are bad. Foreigners are all criminals. That's just racist. So you can't say, hey, let's have these pro-immigration experts. And on the other side, let's invite a couple of racists to have balance. That will be the equivalent to saying, you have some people from the unions who think we need stronger work contracts, more safety and security for society, and we need higher wages. And to have some balance.
On the other side, we're going to invite some slave holders because these slave holders have amazing profit margins and they are doing really well. Let's welcome Mr. and Mrs. Slaveholder. This is not what we do. So when you just think anyone with a different opinion is automatically someone to be listened to, you fell for one thing that we have very present at the moment, and that is the attitude to be heard. People think they do not have a right to opinion, which by the way, they have.
You can have another opinion than the CEO in your organisation and you can have that opinion. You can say it anywhere you like. However, right to opinion does not mean right to a platform. People think and they put on certain people put even on social media, they say, no one makes me speak up. No one allows me to say something. Nothing is allowed anymore to say. And what they want to say is just some ravaging nonsense about just the polar opposite of what common sense is.
The attitude to be heard is people think they have a right to access prime time TV talk shows or that they need to sit across the table with board level members in an organisation just because they have a polar opposite opinion. And that, of course, is absolute nonsense. We need to be aware that the attitude to be heard is something which does not automatically mean your right to an opinion is not a right to get access to platforms. You have a right to your opinion and your opinion should be considered. For example, let's say one thing I frequently see, let's say you have a new logistics software which needs to be implemented in your different warehouses. And suddenly I see this round of decision and I see board level members and I see managers and I see team leads. However, I do not see a single member from the warehouse of people who actually use this software at the end of the day.
I do not see a single member who's handling packages and who says, I think this is a bit too vague. This is a bit too grey here should be blue there or red or yellow. Letters should be larger or smaller. I think this window is completely overloaded with information. We should break it down. The people who use this software, of course, need to be included in the development process. Included in the decision-making process.
They need to be heard. Otherwise, you shouldn't be surprised that they don't accept the software and you have disruptions in your business. Because in this case, they have a share. They have skin in the game. And that means your attitude to be heard means nothing else than feeling entitled to something while you have no skin in the game. You need to be sure that the attitude to be heard is nothing else than entitlement thinking. Just because someone has another opinion doesn't mean we invite them for some balance.
Just because someone is loud with their opinion doesn't mean we need to make them heard on board level or decision maker level. People have the right to their opinion, but then we need to check for expertise and experience. One question always needs to be carefully checked, and that is do they have any backing for what they say? Just because you have a strong opinion doesn't mean that you're right. And by the way, just because you're offended by my opinion doesn't mean that I am wrong. So very important is that the backing needs to be factual. When you say the Earth is flat, you can bring proof.
And when other people have better proof, for example, the Earth is not flat because the Earth is round. Well, it's not 100% round, of course, because when you look at mountains, that's not really round, is it? However, saying we have a flat Earth is just It's absolute, absolute embarrassing nonsense. And there is no backing that actually supports your point, except, oh, look at this picture. And this picture only shows a certain part of the sphere, and that is, there is no curve. Because just recently, when Richard Branson was going up in space and they took a photo there, someone took one photo, which was a tiny, tiny bit of the area where he was flying, oh, I don't see a curve there. So it's flat earth.
That's exactly how you sound when you say stuff like that. And by the way, when you still say, I am entitled to my opinion, I can say that the earth is flat. Yes, of course you can.
It's not illegal. You can say anything you like within certain boundaries. Hate speech, for example, puts boundaries there, because when you say something, you might limit the freedom of others. When you say, Kill the foreigners, that's of course hate speech, and you go to jail for that, rightfully so. But in a very wide space, you can say whatever you want. However, the other side also has a right to that. When someone says, I think Earth is flat.
Any employer has the right to say, I think we don't employ you. And I think we terminate you here with your working contract. Of course, firing someone due to saying the Earth is flat doesn't really make sense, except when they, for example, work somewhere where it is important to understand that the world is not flat. So we see here the scientific backing needs to be given. You need to deliver the proof. When someone, for example, says, oh, here's my opinion. I'm not going to give you any evidence.
You have to do your own research. That is the the definition of nonsense, the definition of clueless talking. And you have these people around there who simply say something and then they just dive deep just not to be asked. So it's very important that you always check for the backing. Do people have a backing? Because then strong opinions. When someone says, hey, we invest into XYZ, we have these couple of stocks.
And I now found evidence that their business model is going down. Here is the evidence. This evidence is omnipresent. We need to pull our money out there. That is an excellent backing when you have the great proof and you will save the company millions, if not billions, from wrong investments. And then you have to listen to the backing whether you like it or not. So very important is the backing drives the matter.
And when we now say, how do we implement that in an organization? Step number one always is, can people factually prove what they say? And that is called scientific backing. And I know what's coming up now very quickly, people will say, oh, I don't have bachelor's or master's degree.
You don't have to. The scientific backing means you have a factual backing. If you, for example, have the scientific qualification, of course, you probably can make a better point. But if you do not have a scientific qualification, then you still can make a good point just by delivering the proof. People will listen to you when they actually are of, let's say, sane mind. When you say, Hey, there's a risk for an accident in our working in our warehouse, which is working very well, but here and here and here, we have hazards, we have issues, people will be injured, potentially be killed, and here's the evidence for that. Then people will say, we do something about that.
And if they don't, they will face the consequences from that. And we had these cases as well. Scientific backing means you are either formally legitimated, bachelor's degree, master's degree, doctorate, or socially legitimated by your experience, by the time you work in the organization, by what you know from real-world experience. In best case, you have both. Then people will most likely listen to you the most. Because the most important thing is that you have participation skin in the game. When you know what you're talking about, you have the formal qualification and the social justification, so you are socially legitimised and formally legitimized, then people will listen to you the most.
So work on that matter. Strong opinion from people who know what they are talking is the decisive point. In the UK, we had a couple of years ago a massive strike of junior doctors. Their salary is still not where it should be, but it led to the fact that people simply said the salary is too low, no one can afford anymore to be a junior doctor. It's extremely hard to study medical sciences. So either you do something about our salary massively, or we will simply quit and go somewhere else. And many people, including some people from my circle of friends, quit to be a junior doctor and went to free enterprise, mainly because of working circumstances and pay. So payment. So here you see participation when people know what they're talking about because they do this job every day and they have the qualification by completing their studies to be a junior doctor, then you should talk with them because they know what they are talking about.
Of course, there's also the government on the other side with budget, with money coming in, with issues with less taxation. Brexit didn't do the UK any favours or less money coming in from there harmed the economy, less tax income there as well. We see both sides then need to sit down and talk about it. But just someone who says, Look, I just googled on the internet, this is the very quick solution. That never helped anyone. When you now bring it down to So what is it that we can just stick to? Is there some kind of formula?
Yes, there is an orientation. There are three to four words you need to take into consideration to look at a strong opinion and then say, is it something we can take into account? And these are all words starting with E.
Three E's are two E's are a minimum. Three E's are better, sometimes even four E's or four words starting with E are better. So the first is, do people have evidence to what they say? The second is, do they have the education backing what they say? Education is something where people simply speak of a clearer mind. Education is good. Anyone saying that education is bad has not understand how any country became great, especially in a world where exporting goods because of greater value to other nations drives a country to wealth.
When you have more clue, you will produce goods with lots of clue in it and other people want to have clue, so they are buying it from you. Education is key to a prosperous nation, if you like it or not. And by the way, the online class for $49, which you should do in your lunch break, which is 30 minutes long and delivered by a motivational inspirational speaker, that is not education. Education is driven by science. Bit hard to learn, but worth the effort. So evidence is number one. Education could be number two.
Number three is experience. Real world experience means a lot. And number four is something which is of course always a bit dangerous, is eloquence. When people are eloquent, it's easier to listen to them. And by the way, this can be learned. I learned rhetoric. I learned how to do free speaking.
I learned how to do public speaking, professional speaking. And anyone can learn that to a certain extent, depending on how much time you want to invest in it. And the main issue here is eloquence should not lead to the fact that people with lots of eloquence talking nonsense, you believe them, and people who have a clue but are less eloquent are ignored because they are less eloquent. And that is often an issue when people are very competent and they spend lots of time on research, they often spend less time on eloquence. And when you're self-employed, you need to do both because no one's going to pay you for a speech which is simply boring. So evidence, education, experience, eloquence. These four aspects, when you take all of them into consideration and do it exactly as we discussed here, then you will come to the conclusion that strong opinions are necessarily bad, but they are also necessarily good.
Check for evidence, check for education, check for experience, and check for eloquence. And when you tick all the four boxes with a very high likelihood, you will have a good contribution, whether you like it or not, and then you can act accordingly and make everything better in your organization. And I wish you all the best doing so. And when you now say, Look, Niels, I have something to say about this.
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