What makes an expert?

At a conference I recently attended, Phillip Adams wittily suggested that most 'experts' are in fact self-appointed.

You may have noticed, at .id, we recently appointed ourselves as 'Population Experts' - which is really an attempt to describe what we have to offer in as few words as possible.

We sincerely believe that viewing places - suburbs, towns, regions etc. through a 'demographic lens' provides decision makers with a profound evidence-based insight into those places.

Any organisation concerned with understanding to whom they are delivering a service, facility or product, needs the evidence before making an investment. Data or information as evidence is all well and good, but it is most powerful when the evidence is presented within the context of a narrative.

Telling stories about places based on evidence that represents the characteristics of people is the basis on which we have designed our decision making tools. We do that with considerable expertise - but who really cares if you're actually an 'expert' or not.

For my money there are the 'experts' who know lots of stuff but can't communicate it... and there are 'experts' who actually don't know lots of stuff but communicate in a way that makes you think they are 'experts' - which often seems to be their main objective!

Anyway, I think the trick is that if you know lots of relevant stuff, it is also very important to share that in the most effective way with the decision makers that count.