Everybody’s Suddenly Brave: The Rise of the Career Candour Copycats
When candour becomes a trend, truth gets lost. This article explores how borrowed voices and stolen tone have taken over professional platforms.
At some point in the last two months, something happened. People who hadn’t formed an original opinion since high school suddenly discovered not just one, but several, bold, cutting-edge insights about the HR, organisational culture, and leadership space.
Weirdly, many of these hot takes happened to align with posts we’d published recently on Career Candour.
Coincidence? Definitely. In the same way that showing up to a party wearing the same outfit as someone else after rifling through their closet is a coincidence.
You’ve probably noticed it, too. The LinkedIn timelines full of people who once posted safe content about “embracing synergy” are now leaning in with swagger, sass, and conveniently “original” frameworks.
This isn’t a renaissance, it’s the performative birth of 'brave' thought leadership, cobbled together from other people’s ideas, fed through AI, and almost never attributed. This isn’t “the marketplace of ideas.” It’s a thrift store of stolen personas.
So, let's explore what’s actually happening here, why it’s infuriating, and what the hell happened to just giving credit where it’s due.
So, Everyone Was Secretly a Candid Truth-Teller All Along
It turns out the professional world is full of previously undiscovered truth-tellers. They were just hiding behind “Monday Motivation” quotes. But now? They’ve apparently tapped into a reservoir of radical candour so potent, they’re out here dropping “brutally honest” insights like they’ve been doing it their whole lives.
Who knew? The softly-spoken marketing coordinator who once posted about “nurturing synergy” is now channeling righteous fury about organisational dysfunction. The property investor with a podcast that reviews ring lights is suddenly deconstructing power dynamics in HR. And the junior PM who’s never had direct reports is somehow reinventing performance management.
And yes, they’re all arriving at this enlightenment independently. Entirely of their own accord. Totally not borrowing from anything they may have recently read on Career Candour.
Their voices? Unmistakably similar. Their tone? A little too familiar. Their timing? Impeccably aligned with the traction we’ve been quietly gaining.
It’s not copying, they’ll insist. It’s “synchronicity.” They “just felt compelled to speak their truth.” It just so happens to be our truth. In our words. With our edge. And their byline.
It’s inspiring, really. The way the brave keep finding their voices, right after we’ve used ours. They don’t need credit, because they’ve been this bold all along. They were just waiting for someone else to go first.
God works in mysterious ways. So does plagiarism. And apparently, so does LinkedIn.
If You’re Going to Steal, At Least Be Good At It
Idea theft isn’t new. History is full of it. The difference between homage and highway robbery has always been razor-thin. The Renaissance? Mostly just Italians looting old Greek ideas, adding cherubs, and calling it a movement. But even they put in the effort.
What we’re seeing now isn’t homage. It’s not even efficient theft. It’s lazy, brittle, low-effort Ctrl+C copying without conscience, coated in faux candour, and uploaded with the confidence of a person who genuinely believes no one saw the original.
It’s not even about inspiration. Career Candour has inspired plenty of people. Many of them repost, tag, write smart follow-ups, or even challenge a point and expand the discourse. That’s not theft. That’s how ideas grow. What we’re dealing with is the sad, flat-footed mimicry of people who want the credibility of insight without the inconvenience of thinking.
Take your pick from the rogues’ gallery:
LinkedIn LARPers pretending they’ve been in the trenches of executive consulting when their closest brush with conflict was a calendar mix-up.
Voice-jackers adopting a sharp, no-BS tone that evaporates the moment they enter a real conversation with their boss.
Idea-squatters who have never touched an OD brief, now “explaining” HR psychology like it came to them in a dream, rather than our blog post from last month.
You want to be edgy? Brave? Say something real? Do the work. Earn the bruises. Form a view based on your actual experience.
Otherwise? Just repost. Tag. Say “this made me think.” You’ll look smarter. You’ll sound smarter. And most importantly, you won’t look like you found someone else’s brain and wore it like a hat.
It’s Fine Not to Be a Creator. Try Having a Life Instead
You don’t need to be a content creator. It’s not a prerequisite for being successful, smart, or interesting. Not everyone needs a platform. Not everyone needs a personal brand. You can have a fulfilling life without ever once posting about “how this one meeting changed your leadership philosophy forever.”
But somewhere along the line, the professional world convinced itself that being visible is the same as being valuable. Everyone is desperately trying to manufacture insight and it shows.
Some people just aren’t creative. Some people don’t have original ideas. Some people aren’t that funny, or deep, or even especially good at distilling complex ideas into clean, shareable thoughts. And you know what? That’s fine. The world needs great operators. Reliable doers. Quiet, competent professionals.
But instead of embracing that, we now have people burning hours trying to reverse-engineer the performance of creativity. They’re scraping posts, recycling tone, repackaging frameworks they barely understand, and adding just enough “vulnerability” to make it feel like something you’re meant to clap for.
You want to use AI? Go ahead. AI’s not the villain here. Your fragile need to feel seen is. Because apparently, not posting this week would feel like career death. The silence would be too loud. So instead of sitting with that feeling (or doing your actual job) you steal someone else’s persona and throw it into a carousel.
So if you’re spiraling over not having a post this week, take a walk. Call your mum. Read a book. Maybe you don’t need a post.. Maybe you just need to go outside.
Candour Is a Muscle, Not a Filter
Let’s talk about the new favourite buzzword in professional cosplay: “candour.”
It’s suddenly everywhere. People who, until last month, were posting beige career advice in the tone of a LinkedIn chatbot have now discovered “radical honesty.” They’re bold. They’re raw. They’re apparently the first person in history to call out bad leadership. Just don’t ask them to name a time they’ve actually done it in real life.
Candour isn’t a tone setting. It’s not something you toggle on for engagement. It’s a muscle that’s developed through friction.
We didn’t set out to build a “candid brand.” We just are candid. It wasn’t strategy. It was personality, shaped by actual experience. And not all of it fun. We’ve been told we were too direct, too difficult, “not aligned with leadership tone.” We’ve lost work for telling the truth. We’ve also kept work for exactly the same reason. That’s the deal.
Candour has consequences. It comes with risk. It’s not tweeting a hot take from behind a logo or posting a spicy-sounding rant with zero real-world receipts. It’s sitting across from someone in power and telling them their plan is built on quicksand.
So when people with no track record of real talk suddenly rebrand as truth-tellers? It’s not refreshing. It’s insulting. Especially when they’re clearly imitating the cadence, the topics, even the phrasing of voices they used to quietly follow.
And spare us the profanity-as-authenticity routine. Dropping a few F-bombs into a post doesn’t make you brave. It just means you’ve learned where the algorithm stops censoring.
If you’re going to claim candour, earn it. Otherwise, maybe just keep your faux bravado in the drafts folder where it belongs.
Let’s bring this home.
If something someone said resonates with you, great. That’s how ideas work. Credit the source, add your perspective, move the conversation forward. That’s called contribution.
If you’ve got something original to say, even better. Say it in your own words, in your own tone, grounded in your own experience. You don’t need to imitate someone else’s voice just because it’s getting attention.
And if you’ve got nothing to say? Honestly, that’s fine too. The internet is overflowing with content. We could all benefit from a few more professionals who are comfortable doing good work quietly, without needing to turn every waking insight into a carousel post.
What’s not fine is pretending. Stealing someone’s concept, dressing it up in your knockoff version of candour, and posting it like you discovered fire during your morning coffee. That’s not bravery.
Before you hit publish, just pause and ask: “Is this mine? Would I say it out loud if no one clapped?”
If the answer is no, don’t post it. Repost the real thing. Credit where it’s due. Then maybe take a walk. Sit with a thought that’s actually yours. Start there.
The rest will take care of itself.
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