The Monkey Parable (Or, Enough with the Best Practice Shaming!)
We need to learn from five specific monkeys.
(Here you are, going about your day, probably thinking you want to learn from all the monkeys. Silly human.)
Five monkeys are sitting in a cage at the zoo: Fluffy, Duffy, Scruffy, Muffy, and Sam. One day, the zookeeper places a ladder in the middle of their habitat. At the top, she places a few bananas. Naturally, one intrepid monkey (probably Sam) decides to climb the ladder and grab the reward, but right before he reaches the top, the zookeeper comes sprinting over with a hose and blasts all five monkeys with icy water.
Shaken but not broken, feisty little Sam tries again. The zookeeper instantly sprays Sam again—along with all the others.
The monkeys dry themselves off and grumble about the water and the ladder and the economy, and that's when Fluffy decides it's her turn. She starts climbing and, sure enough, the zookeeper comes running back with the hose and sprays all five of our furry friends. They hoot and holler and complain about gas prices, and now it's Duffy's turn. WHOOSH goes the hose. Then Scruffy. WHOOSH. Then Muffy. WHOOSH. Then the ever-determined Sam decides he's had enough of the water and the zookeeper and the crazy cost of eggs and the housing shortage, and he goes sprinting towards the ladder once more.
But then a funny thing happens.
All the other monkeys grab Sam and yank him down off the ladder. The zookeeper doesn't need to budge, doesn’t need the hose at all. The monkeys stopped Sam themselves.
Then Muffy, ever the opportunist, sees her chance while Sam shouts at the others. (SO Muffy, right?) Now she starts climbing the ladder. But then all the others pull her off and start whacking her on her head.
Then an even funnier thing happens.
The next day, the zookeeper returns, but instead of dragging a hose, she's carrying a new monkey. She removes Fluffy from the cage and drops Larry in her place. After saying hello and voicing his opinions on gerrymandering, Larry spots the ladder and the bananas. He starts to climb, but before he can reach the third step, all the others tackle him to the ground and start wailing on him and screeching.
Over the next few days, the zookeeper swaps out each of the original five monkeys, one by one. Naturally, each new monkey tries to climb the ladder to get the bananas, but every time they do, all the other monkeys attack the new one.
By the end of the month, none of the original five monkeys remain. None of the current crew has ever been sprayed by the hose either. But each and every time a monkey tries to climb the ladder, all the others pull him down and beat him up. And why?
Because that's how we do things around here.
* * *
Creativity is a funny thing. You live a life and build a career where “the way we do things around here” is your enemy. By definition, to be creative is to fight stagnation and the status quo. Maybe you're like me and actively shout about the problems with those things, or maybe you quietly do good work, but regardless, being creative is the process of challenging the convention. Because being creative requires two things: trial and error.
You have an idea, wish to solve a problem, or imagine something interesting, and so you try it. In trying it, you learn (far better than you could learn in theory, in your head, before taking any action). In learning, you modify this current attempt or adapt future versions of the thing, thus getting better. Extrapolate that out far enough, and people might even declare that you're innovative, a leader, a visionary ... or just call you creative.
Everywhere you go, you're running the same equation in your work:
Creativity = repetition + reinvention, over time.
You try, you learn, you try again but differently. Over and over again.
This is the monkeys’ worst nightmare. You keep climbing the ladder. You keep refusing their demands to come down. You kick them aside when they rush at you, and you reject the very notion that the way we do things around here makes any sense at all. I mean, can they even explain WHY we do things that way? Hardly.
The act of trial and error is where you uncover all the rewards, all the fruits of your labor—and all the things you need to stand out and see results. By trying, learning, and adjusting, you develop your personal style and tone of voice; you learn what you were really trying to say all along and how you should say it so it resonates; you discover big new aspects of the work and tiny but magical wrinkles to add. Everything you and I want from this work is found through the act of creating, and the act of creating is the act of trial and error.
But increasingly on the internet, more and more people love to discourage us from embracing trial and error. (That word is so telling, isn’t it? Discourage. The removal of courage. Making you feel less confident or excited. Such a shame.)
For example, recently, I've started investing more in video. Already, I've gone through a ton of trial and error, with a handful of things really working for me so far, like short, emotional clips on LinkedIn (a very Jay-way to show up in this world), along with my behind-the-scenes series taking you inside my process, and even a coaching call I shared publicly, with more on the way.
Time and time again, whether publicly or privately, people see these experiments of mine and begin to discourage the trial and error process. In short, they “best practice” me to death. I didn't caption things the right way. I didn't start the video the right way. I didn't use the right techniques here or there. And Jay, did you know know there's an app which can do this part or that part? Did you hear about the algorithm change which rewards THIS kind of format instead of THAT one?
It's like they have some kind of monkey-sense that tingles anytime someone posts a video that isn't their precise idea of the "right" way. They run over, giddy. They finally get to correct someone, finally get to share the best practices they hold dear, but that sharing feels more like bludgeoning. Here I am, trying to fill myself like a balloon, and they come running with razors.
Enough.
Nobody has ever "best practiced" their way to anything exceptional.
Look, sometimes, I appreciate their input. (Oh, just to clarify: the word "sometimes" is written in size Earth font. Your technology may be unable to show that.) SOMETIMES, I appreciate it. MOSTLY, I just get annoyed. They're being monkeys, and not even the monkeys who were initially blasted with water. They're like 12 generations later, declaring they know for sure how something must be done. And why?
Because reasons.
Because that's “what works.”
Because that's how we do things around here.
It's like mansplaining but gender neutral and for marketers.
It's marsplaining.
I don't need to be marsplained. Best practices are just average practices, and I am wholly, enthusiastically, and hilariously uninterested in being average. Aren't you?
I'm so uninterested in average practices, in fact, that I see the suggestions and hear the critiques and watch their passionate demands, and I feel … bored. I'm no longer stressed out being told I'm "doing it wrong." I'm just casually bothered. Shoo, monkey. Don't bother me.
But I’m the weirdo with too much (often unearned) confidence and a track record. Maybe you feel bothered by the monkeys. That’s totally okay, and making matters worse is what has happened to the creation of “best practices.”
The Best Practice Creation Cycle Is In Hyperdrive
When I started my career, the term "content marketing" was barely a thing (he writes, stepping outside to tell local kids to get off his lawn). Back in those days (he says, pulling his khakis above his navel), a best practice would take shape slowly, only after a little while of people doing something a certain way and reporting back positive results. Best practices even then really average practices—table stakes approaches which, yes, plenty still failed to execute—but they at least took a moment to harden into place, like crystals beneath the ground.
Then, after a few years of this “content marketing” thing being around, I watched as best practices formed at a much faster rate. Sometimes, that was due to technology's rate of change. Mostly, however, it was due to a few influential voices or brands publishing their own tactics as THE tactics everyone should DEFINITELY use. For example, when I briefly worked at HubSpot as head of content, I arrived to discover that the team would often write ebooks detailing a single tactic they’d used to much success. There’s nothing wrong sharing what works for you with others, but what was alarming was the way it was packaged, promoted, discussed within the pages. I guess "The Ultimate Guide to Social Media Marketing" sounds a lot better than "The Story of Something We Did That Worked.”
So the rise of advice content, built on anecdotes and singular examples, meant that everyone assumed a “best practice” was widely the best, and not what it really was: a person or brand with influence, declaring their way was THE way. This meant best practices calcified NOT like crystals deep underground but like the icicles currently hanging off my house: overnight.
(Spoiler alert: those things also melted away just as fast.)
Fast-forward to today, and this has all kicked into hyperdrive. Best practices aren't like crystals hardened into form under ground or even ice crackling and clinging to my roof. They're more like ... cheap plastic trinkets 3D printed by a factory and dropped into goodie bags my kids bring home from birthday parties. They have the same fate too, because though I’d never say this to my kids, those toys are just trash-in-waiting. Maybe I let them sit on the counter for a weekend, or maybe I make the decision right away, but they’re going in the garbage. Fast.
Best practices are just average practices with a better PR team. Today, they take shape based on a loud influencer or two and a bunch of sycophants clinging to their every word, or else someone declaring they’ve cracked the algorithm and sharing “what works.”
Trash in waiting.
So when YOU do something different, not to be a rebel (though maybe) but because you embrace trial and error, here come the monkeys to drag you down. Except they aren't the original five. They've lost the script entirely. They're not rooted in firsthand experience or even first principles. They're just eager to tell you: that’s NOT how we do things around here.
In 2018, I wrote a book about my frustrations with our over-reliance on alleged best practices. I called it Break the Wheel: Question Best Practices, Hone Your Intuition, and Do Your Best Work. Because finding best practices isn't the goal. Finding the best approach for you is. So how do you make better choices for YOU, regardless of the general advice out there?
I think the lessons of the book may be even more important today, as more and more monkeys come rushing at you each and every time you attempt to try anything new or different. Trial and error is a forgotten art form—and how dare you even attempt things without first researching the “correct” way to do those things, ideally for 7 months before shipping a single thing? The nerve!
The monkeys rush you, bludgeoning you with best practices, because it's their way of feeling part of the tribe, their way of feeling safe and valued. They do it with so much confidence, too, that if you didn't know any better or if you didn’t have my level of unearned (and somewhat sometimes earned) confidence, you might actually be convinced to change course … or stop.
And look, even broken clocks are right twice a day, but for the other 1,438 minutes, they're unhelpful.
Everything I create publicly is meant to push you towards creating something better. I want you to make meaningful things, to craft meaningful ideas, to develop meaning messaging and speeches, and to stand out easier and resonate deeper on the power of your ideas, not the volume of your marketing. But to do that, and to develop your premise and your IP, is to embrace the development process. Trial and error. It means aerating your thinking, learning, and iterating.
My message doesn't stick if we're all afraid of trying stuff, failing, and trying again. My work doesn't make a difference if we're convinced by overconfident monkeys that the answers come from some set of absolutes, some rules we can find "out there,” instead of where the best answers await. (Here, I'm tapping you on your head.) In there.
My request of you, today and always, is to ignore the monkeys. They don't know what they're doing or saying. Not really.
The good news is, they aren't physically grabbing you. It's a mental and emotional friction they provide. That doesn't make it any less real, but if we can learn to ignore them, we can keep going. I see too many people who never start or decide to stop because of those damn monkeys. I get too many emails and DMs asking me for the "right way" of doing something creative. (Your way, I reply.) I see too much confidence placed in people who haven’t earned theirs. Usually, this is at the expense of producing higher-value, highly original work—work that could only come from YOU.
That breaks my heart.
Creativity = repetition + reinvention, over time.
This work is trial and error. But we exist in an era where that's discouraged. People don't like seeing you try, and more rapidly than ever, they want to correct your errors. This gets even harder when your work requires you to show up publicly each week, as yours and mine does. We might feel too vulnerable, too threatened, or too exposed to persist. It’s easy to feel tackled to the ground, beaten down.
I'm begging you to get back up, and get back on the ladder.
Keep climbing.