Imagine that there are invisible man-eating giants that only one person can see.
Yes, this is a plot point from Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.
Let's imagine for a second that the giants, though invisible, are real and are a threat to everyone, despite being visible to only one character.
Imagine the person who can see them notices one sleeping in the corner of the team's conference room during a meeting.
Quietly, he says: "I don't want to alarm everyone, but there's an invisible giant in that corner. If we all stay calm and exit towards the hallway it will be…"
One of the team members, loudly: "Huh?! I don't see anything!"
The seer, more urgently: "SHHH!! Shhh. There is a SLEEPING. GIANT. If we are quiet we can…"
The team member, now louder. "I REALLY DO NOT SEE WHAT YOU'RE SAYING. WE HAVE IMPORTANT BUSINESS TO ATTEND TO…"
The seer, impatient, riled up, defensive, agitated, and now much louder: "WE. NEED. TO. ESCAPE."
The team member, frustrated, now pacing the room, steps away from tripping over the invisible giant: "It's hard to listen to you when you're being so shrill. If we could just turn to the matter of our weekly team meeting…"
As the seer gets more riled up, everyone gets more dismissive, making the seer even more riled up and not thinking clearly.
A tragic spiral.
This happens every day in organizations. Someone sees something they know is real but is hard for others to see.
It is an existential threat.
The more they try to point it out, the more people don't listen, and they become even more riled up, even less credible.
If you see an invisible giant no one else sees, you can't help but get existentially activated.
But what if you're wrong?
Or the other people see a different, more dangerous giant than you do?
For example, what if yelling at other people and demotivating them about the existence of a smaller invisible giant is the more dangerous invisible giant?