"Treat the earth well: it was not given to you by your parents, it was loaned to you by your children. We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our Children."
It may be an urban myth Columbus named the natives Indians thinking he had discovered a new route to India.
But it summarizes the point of this blogpost in one sentence.
We can not blame Columbus for making that mistake, he just could not see the whole picture yet.
Hundreds of MVPs explored the new world in alfa and beta releases long before us mortal souls were allowed to take a look at it.
They explored new functionalities, new possibilities and learned new 'stuff';
once the Non-Disclosure-Agreement is lifted they will blog frantically about the new lands and people they met.
If you are one of the early explorers, you have seen it happen before in 2003, 2007, 2010 and 2013
Alas the way Internet the works makes this First Knowledge stick forever and be perpetuated by new followers.
Popular, but oldfashioned blogposts get more popular over time.
They are not rewritten with new finds and insights, like The History of Discovery of the Americas
It doesn't stop at blogposts, this world is filled with developers copying code from StackOverflow.
Alas many SharePoint Gurus left StackOverflow after the novelty wore of and they ventured into new Yammer lands. Yet their credits remain on StackOverflow and ancient texts are now guiding new travellers who haven't found Yammer yet.
Like Columbus had a hard time later in life with new insights, we Consultants and Developers are humans also.
We may have used SharePoint 2016 for the past months.
But our thoughts, actions and advice are largely guided by old knowledge and old mindsets.
The proof of human deficiency we provide ourself.
When we blame our customers on the biggest problem with SharePoint: Adoption
They are stuck in a Yellow-Folder mindset and have a hard time learning something new
So the next time you hear a person say
I am a Microsoft Valued Professional since version 2001
Think about Columbus and the Indians
MVPs may have seen the picture first, but you may question if they understand the whole/new picture.
We should embrace new knowledge, new insights, but above all new people.
Hire that young gun who has never seen SharePoint 2013 but has the Agile mindset.
They will take us to the stars, not the MVP who runs his ship like it is 1492
