What my viral post taught me

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What my viral post taught me

· Communication,Leadership,Authenticity

We Buy Junk, Sell Antiques — and Why That Post Went Viral (for me)

On 1st October, I posted a photo of a sign that read:
“We buy junk and sell antiques. Some fools buy, some fools sell.”

It struck me as a witty metaphor for leadership’s obsession with transparency.
I wrote about discernment, judgment, and selective honesty — themes that sit squarely in my usual territory of leadership and professional effectiveness.

But what surprised me was what happened next.
That post drew more than 236,000 impressions, 918 reactions, and over 80 comments — many times more than my most carefully researched or academically grounded posts on leadership, careers, or coaching.

In that same week, my profile views spiked to a yearly high, and new connection requests tripled. So what happened?

I wrote

At theINSEAD Alumni Association Singaporelunch yesterday, I couldn’t help noticing the shop across the road with a sign that read:

“We buy junk and sell antiques. Some fools buy, some fools sell.”

It struck me as a useful metaphor for leadership’s obsession with transparency. We glorify it as a universal virtue, but the science suggests otherwise.

In reality, nobody wants complete transparency at work. Research on authenticity, self-disclosure, and impression management is clear: most of our thoughts are better left unsaid. Raw and unfiltered, they are more likely to be noise than signal.

What distinguishes effective leaders is not radical transparency, but radical judgment. The ability to curate. To decide what to reveal, when, and how. To filter out the junk and highlight the valuable insights that can actually drive trust, motivation, and performance.

In fact, studies show that oversharing is just as damaging as secrecy. Authenticity, in practice, is about selective self-disclosure: the ability to balance honesty with discretion, candour with tact.

So the question for leaders is not: How transparent are you? But rather: How good are you at curating your transparency?

Because in leadership, as in antiques, value lies in discernment.

My Reflections

1. The power of a sign — and the allure of ironyThe shopfront was doing something I rarely do: making people smile before making them think.
The sign worked on two levels — humour and truth. It let readers project their own experiences onto it. Whether you saw commerce, self-deception, or philosophy, the message found you.
In leadership terms, it wasn’t just a metaphor. It was a mirror.

2. The visual hookThe photo itself mattered. It had texture, place, and humanity.
The peeling paint and potted plants grounded the reflection in the real world — not in a theory or slide deck. That concreteness made the post scroll-stopping, not just thought-provoking.

3. Accessible intellectThe post offered insight without jargon. It invited readers into an idea rather than lecturing them.
When we connect academic ideas (like selective self-disclosure) with lived human moments (a shop sign in Chinatown), the ideas become shareable, not just admirable.

4. The emotional ratioMy usual posts are professional, reflective, occasionally provocative — but this one had a different emotional texture. It started with curiosity and wit before moving to intellect and principle.
That’s the inverse of how many thought-leaders write: intellect first, emotion second.
In social media terms, I led with feeling and followed with thinking.

5. The deeper parallelPerhaps the sign’s message explains not just the post’s success, but the dynamic of thought leadership itself. Every day on LinkedIn, we all “buy and sell” ideas. Some are junk, some become antiques. The craft — in content as in leadership — lies in discernment: knowing which ideas to trade, which to keep polishing, and which to quietly retire.

My Takeaway

The sign’s lesson for me wasn’t just about leadership transparency. It was about communication itself:
“Value lies in discernment.”
 
Not just in what we say, but in what we choose to say — and how we frame it so others can see themselves in it.
 
Perhaps that’s the paradox: the post about selective transparency succeeded because it practiced what it preached. It revealed just enough truth to invite others to complete the thought.