Companies can underestimate the collective wisdom of their employees

Jules Goddard and Tony Eccles

This article explores how the collective intelligence of a large group of well-informed people can sometime be more useful than the input of a single expert.

TRANSITION: From expert knowledge to crowd wisdom

"If a group is smart enough to find a real expert, it's more than smart enough not to need one."

James Surowiecki

There are some problems that are clearly better solved by a crowd than by an expert: guessing the number of jellybeans in a glass jar, estimating the weight of a sow at a village fair or betting on the outcome of a cup final.

There are other problems that are better left to an expert: performing a triple bypass operation, piloting an Airbus 380 or playing Beethoven's Hammerklavier sonata.

But...

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