What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession or area of expertise?
Recorded Tony Fadell said elsewhere, not written here
every time I heard the word “smart” attached to anything, it means it’s pretty dumb, because no one knows what it really does. They just add “smart” as a prefix to say, “Oh, you must buy this, because it’s smart.” If they can’t tell you what it does and why it does it, don’t buy it just because it says “smart.”

Academy of Achievement interview, 5 February 2016 source ↗

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Katie Taylor Irish professional boxer; Olympic champion 2012
I have never felt the need to trash talk, and I'm not going to start now! I just quietly do my job and then quietly step into the ring to showcase what I can do. And one thing is for sure: I'm going to leave it all in the ring. I've always had such a will to win, and I always give my heart and my soul, so I don't need to change who I am.
Recorded RTÉ, 7 July 2025 source ↗
Rahul Dravid India Test and one-day international cricketer, 1996–2012; later India head coach
Let us not be so satisfied with the present, with deals and finances in hand that we get blindsided. Everything that has given cricket its power and influence in the world of sports has started from that fan in the stadium. They deserve our respect and let us not take them for granted. Disrespecting fans is disrespecting the game.
Recorded Bradman Oration, Anzac Hall, Australian War Memorial, Canberra, ESPNcricinfo, 14 December 2011 source ↗
John Lewis U.S. Representative from Georgia, 1987–2020; Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 1963–1966
I would come home and ask my mother, my father, my grandparents, my great-grandparents, 'Why?'. And they would say, 'That's the way it is. Don't get in the way, don't get in trouble!'
Recorded Emory University Quadrangle, Atlanta, Speakola (speech transcript archive), 12 May 2014 source ↗
Zadie Smith Novelist and essayist
Don’t romanticise your “vocation”. You can either write good sentences or you can’t. There is no “writer’s lifestyle”. All that matters is what you leave on the page.
Recorded The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 source ↗

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