Howdy folks — Glenn Blamstead here, still building pole barns, still drinking coffee that’s never quite hot enough, and still trying to figure out why people do things just because everyone else is doing them. Today’s topic comes from a phrase I’ve been thinking about for a while now, mostly because I’ve lived it more times than I’d like to admit. “When you blindly follow the masses, sometimes the ‘S’ is silent.”
And yes, before you ask — I’m aware that makes the word “mass,” which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense either. But stick with me here, because the point isn’t about spelling.
It’s about the fact that following the crowd without asking questions is a reliable way to end up somewhere you never meant to go, doing something you never quite understood, and wondering how you got there in the first place. Kind of like that time I followed GPS directions straight into a lake. The GPS was very confident. The lake was very wet. Neither of those facts made the situation better.
The Comfort of Company (and Its Hidden Costs)
There’s something deeply reassuring about doing what everyone else is doing. Safety in numbers. Validation in routine. The comforting belief that if everyone’s heading in the same direction, it must be the right one.
Except it isn’t always. Sometimes it’s just the loudest one. Or the easiest. Or the one that doesn’t require anyone to stop and think for more than seven seconds. I’ve seen it in construction more times than I can count. Someone starts a trend — maybe it’s a particular framing method, maybe it’s a shortcut that saves fifteen minutes — and suddenly everyone’s doing it. Not because it’s better. Not because it makes sense. But because it’s what you’re supposed to do now.
It’s like fashion, except with lumber and the occasional structural failure. Nobody questions it. Nobody checks. They just follow. And most of the time, it’s fine. But every once in a while, it’s not fine. It’s expensive. Or dangerous. Or both. And by the time someone notices, there are already ten buildings framed the wrong way and a whole lot of people insisting it’s normal because, well, everyone’s been doing it for months now.
I once watched an entire crew spend a morning installing something backwards because the first guy did it backwards, and nobody wanted to be the person who pointed it out. By lunch, we had a very confident, very incorrect installation that required an afternoon of sheepish dismantling. The crowd was united. The crowd was also wrong.
Mass Becomes Ass When Nobody’s Driving
The problem with following crowds is that crowds don’t have drivers.
They don’t have plans. They don’t have destination markers or clearly labeled exits. They just move. And they move confidently, which is the most dangerous part. Confidence is contagious, especially when it’s unearned. I’ve made decisions based purely on the fact that someone else seemed sure. Didn’t ask why. Didn’t double-check. Just figured if they were that confident, they must know something I didn’t.
Turns out, they didn’t. They were just louder than I was, which is apparently a leadership quality now. Construction has a lot of strong opinions, many of them delivered with absolute certainty by people who’ve been wrong before and will be wrong again. I know a guy who swears you can eyeball a 90-degree angle. Can’t do it. Never could. But he says it with such conviction that you almost believe him until the walls don’t meet and suddenly geometry matters again.
The trick is recognizing that certainty and correctness are not the same thing. One sounds convincing. The other holds weight when the inspector shows up. And inspectors, bless them, do not care how confident you were.
When Instinct Gets Overruled by Consensus
Here’s a moment I’ve lived too many times to feel good about: standing on a job site, looking at something that doesn’t sit right, and saying nothing because everyone else seems fine with it.
Maybe it’s a measurement that feels off. Maybe it’s a decision that seems rushed. Maybe it’s just a vague sense of unease that refuses to form into words, like when you walk into a room and forget why you’re there, except this time there’s lumber involved.
Whatever it is, it’s there. And I ignore it. Why?
Because the crowd is moving, and stopping to ask questions feels like slowing everyone down. So I go with it. I follow the flow. I trust the collective judgment, even though my instinct is whispering that something’s not quite right. And later — sometimes hours, sometimes days — it turns out my instinct was correct. The measurement was off. The decision was rushed. The unease had a name, and that name was “problem we now have to fix while pretending we knew it was coming.”
Following the masses doesn’t erase your instinct. It just convinces you to ignore it. Which is a shame, because instinct is free and doesn’t require batteries.
The Cost of Going Along to Get Along
There’s a social pressure in doing what everyone else is doing, especially in work environments where efficiency matters and questioning things slows the process down. Nobody wants to be the person who asks, “Are we sure about this?” when everyone else is already ten steps ahead.
It’s like being the person at a party who asks if anyone checked the expiration date on the dip. Technically a valid question. Socially awkward timing.
But here’s the thing: being the person who asks is often the only thing standing between smooth progress and expensive mistakes. I’ve learned — slowly, reluctantly, and with more regret than I’d prefer — that it’s better to ask a dumb question than to silently participate in a bad decision. Dumb questions get answered. Bad decisions get repeated until someone finally stops long enough to notice the pattern, usually right around the time the invoice arrives.
The cost of going along isn’t just professional. It’s personal. Every time you ignore your own judgment to match someone else’s confidence, you lose a little trust in yourself. And that trust is harder to rebuild than any structure. Plus, it doesn’t come with a warranty.
Crowds Don’t Build — Individuals Do
Buildings don’t get framed by committees. They get framed by people who measure, decide, and take responsibility for what they’ve done. The same goes for life decisions, project plans, and pretty much everything else worth doing well.
Crowds provide momentum. They provide noise. They provide the illusion of consensus and, occasionally, someone who brought donuts.
But they don’t build anything.
Individuals do. Teams do. People who are willing to stop, check, ask, and take ownership of their choices — those are the ones who build things that last.
I’ve been in meetings where ten people agreed on something, and not one of them could explain why. Just a room full of nodding heads and zero clarity. Felt like a support group for people who lost an argument with themselves.
Following the masses works fine when the masses know where they’re going. But when they don’t — when the momentum is just inertia wearing a confident smile and carrying a clipboard — that’s when you need to plant your feet, look around, and decide if this is actually where you want to be. Or if you’re just here because everyone else showed up first.
When the ‘M’ Goes Silent, Pay Attention
The joke in the title isn’t really a joke. It’s a reminder. When you follow blindly, when you trust the crowd without questioning, you’re not participating in mass movement — you’re participating in something else entirely.
Something less thoughtful. Something more reckless. Something that rhymes and probably involves apologizing later. And the moment you realize it — the moment you see the mistake, the wasted effort, the avoidable cost — you also realize you knew better. You just didn’t trust yourself enough to act on it. You were too busy keeping up with people who also didn’t know what they were doing but had better posture about it.
So here’s the advice I wish I’d taken sooner: trust your instinct. Ask the dumb question. Pause when something feels off. Stop when everyone else is rushing forward and you’re not sure why. The crowd will keep moving. They always do. They’ve got places to be and a deep commitment to not slowing down long enough to realize they’re lost.
But you don’t have to move with them if you’re not sure where they’re going. Sometimes the smartest thing you can do is stand still long enough to figure out if following makes sense — or if you’re just doing it because everyone else is, and nobody wants to admit they have no idea what’s happening. And if that makes you the person who slows things down? Good. Someone needs to.
Buildings hold up better when someone bothers to check the foundation. So do decisions. So does your dignity, which is harder to repair than drywall and doesn’t come with instructions.
— Glenn Blamstead
Still asking questions, still double-checking measurements, and still convinced that thinking for yourself is underrated — mostly because I’ve tried the alternative and it didn’t go well.
