I Own 850 Bobbleheads of Myself

I own 850 bobbleheads of myself. Let me explain.

The post-it

A while back I put a post-it on my monitor. Four words: Have you tried AI?

I've written about it before, so I'll keep the recap short. Those four words do four jobs for a leader. They remind you. They give you a question to ask the next time someone on your team brings you a problem (and the answer, more often than you'd think, is "no, it didn't occur to me"). They hand that person permission, which matters because plenty of people's real answer is "I didn't know I was allowed." And they stock your story reservoir, because whether the answer is yes or no, the follow-up conversation gives you a story to tell the next person.

That article has held up. I still get notes from leaders who put the post-it up and watched their team change.

The chain

Sometime in the last year I was in a friend's office and spotted a copy of Ideaflow on his desk. He is not the kind of guy I'd expect to keep Ideaflow on his desk. So I asked, and he told me the thing he loves about having it there is that people ask about it, which gives him an excuse to brag on his friend.

Which was very kind. But what stuck with me was something I'd never considered: a book on a desk is a conversation starter. Nobody has to bring it up; the book does it for them. And I got curious about what else could do that job. What other object sits on someone's desk and sparks a conversation?

That led to a silly idea. Why not make a bobblehead… of myself… holding a post-it…?

A post-it that says, you guessed it, "Have you tried AI?"

I found this hilarious. I still do (my kids do, too, and yes, it's embarrassing when they show house guests their "daddy bobbleheads").

Then I remembered I have friends in the sports world, and the sports world knows exactly who makes bobbleheads. One introduction became one phone call became a mold became a proof became, faster than I'd like to admit, a thousand units.

A hundred are in my office. I'm keeping those. Don't ask.

The other nine hundred are sitting in a warehouse, and I've managed to give away about fifty of them, because I've been mentioning the whole thing in the footer of my newsletter like it's an afterthought.

So: 850 bobbleheads.

Why I'm not embarrassed (mostly)

In the middle of that chain, I also happened to be finishing a book.

The Human Advantage comes out November 10th, and its argument fits on a post-it too: AI is a force multiplier, and it can only multiply what you bring to it. Most people show up to the collaboration like they're the robot: flat, careful, generic. The people getting outsized leverage show up human, with their expertise and their judgment and their taste, and yes, their quirks. The more of yourself you bring, the more you get back.

I won't pretend the book argues for bobbleheads. But I'll admit the bobblehead is what "bring your quirks" looks like when nobody stops you.

And the logic behind it is sound. The post-it works because it's in your line of sight all day. The bobblehead is the post-it that can't fall off the monitor. It sits at the corner of your desk, and every person who walks by asks the question for you.

The free version

Before the pitch, the part that costs nothing.

Write the four words on a post-it and put it where you'll see it. Ask yourself the question once a day. Ask one other person once a day. Do that for a month and you'll get most of what a bobblehead would give you.

The only thing the post-it can't do is make other people ask you.

The offer

So, the 850.

If you pre-order the book this week, I'll send you one (unless more than 850 people do so, in which case you and I will both be pleasantly surprised).

The mechanics are simple. Order The Human Advantage wherever you buy books (Amazon is here, any format counts). Then email your receipt to jeremy@jeremyutley.com, and I'll send you instructions for how to make sure you get your very own silly desktop conversation starter. I need your info by Monday night, September 21, because that's when the warehouse ships. Miss it and I can't get you one.

Two caveats. The bobbleheads can only ship inside the US for now; I've asked, and the answer for international friends is "not yet." And I'll be announcing a set of other pre-order bonuses over the next few weeks (some of which I'm more excited about than a bobblehead, which is saying something). If you pre-order now, you'll be grandfathered in for all of them, even though I haven't publicly announced what they are yet. I can assure you they are cool.

If you want a reason beyond the bobblehead: pre-orders all count in the book's first week, and first-week numbers are the whole game for a book. Every copy ordered now is a copy that shows up when it matters.

And if you're a leader who already has the post-it on your monitor, consider ordering a second copy for the person on your team you most want to ask the question. Bobblehead on your desk, book on theirs.

That's the pitch. I have 850 reasons to hope it works.

Related: "Have You Tried AI?" The Answer Every Leader Should Give

Related: Don't Use AI. Work With It.

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