Which is more valuable, good ideas or good people? No matter whether I was talking to retired business executives or students, to high school principals or artists, when I asked for a show of hands , the audiences would be split 50-50. (Statisticians will tell you that when you get a perfect split like this, it doesn't mean that half know the right answer— it means that they are all guessing , picking at random ideas... Why are we confused about this? Because too many of us think of ideas as being singular, as if they float in the ether, fully formed and independent of the people who wrestle with them. Ideas, though, are not singular. They are forged through tens of thousands of decisions, often made by dozens of people.