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When Smart People are Bad Employees

blogs.forbes.com

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Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#91

Post by pbhjpbhj »

DuncanIdaho wrote: post #83
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He doesn't get any preferential treatment from me [...] [knowing about his past] is valuable to me so I can put our relationship in right context. I don't understand how knowing about his past should matter if you're not going to behave differently towards him? That's like asking someone’s sex on an application form - if you're not going to discriminate why do you need to know.

To give you more detail. Addict is never really cured. Once you're through with addiction, the cravings are there for life. Whenever you need to release your steam the craving for drug kicks back in. My mentee is coping with that through writing, so sometimes he will not come to work on time - because he's setting his mind straight. So our agreement is that I don't care about his schedule - as long as his work is don…

I'm 100% with you on your goal, it's a noble act to mentor someone with the spirit that you appear to be applying.

However, it sounds like you are giving them preferential treatment. You say it's just different, but then if those differences aren't available to others they might also advantage it is a preferential treatment.

I guess one could argue it's not preferential in that you'd give the same assistance to another ex-addict.

Personally I don't think you have to help everyone just because you're helping someone, ie preferential treatment doesn't seem wrong to me a priori.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#92

Post by pbhjpbhj »

sophacles wrote: post #68
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>He doesn't get any preferential treatment from me [...] [knowing about his past] is valuable to me so I can put our relationship in right context. I don't understand how knowing about his past should matter if you're not going to behave differently towards him? That's like asking someone’s sex on an application form - if you're not going to discriminate why do you need to know.

He is differentiating that the past was a problem rather than the present. See, if the guy was a 37yo rookie because of current, actively on-going problems, then the past would still not matter, but there would be good reason to be wary. So finding out that the thing is in the past is an exercise in finding out enough to dismiss qualms. You are being disingenuous btw -- this is not like the gender question at all.

>You are being disingenuous btw -- this is not like the gender question at all.

I beg to differ. Could you provide some reasoning?

>but there would be good reason to be wary

If you're not discriminating then it doesn't matter if they're a current drug addict, a past drug addict, partner of a drug addict - you judge them solely on their performance at work.

I say discriminate.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#93

Post by naner »

rdl wrote: post #36
naner wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I worded this poorly but I was disapproving of his Kanye quote, not the lead-in from the blog owner.

Ben Horowitz's "ben's blog" always leads off with a thematic rap lyric; it works pretty well in some cases, but fails in others. I don't think this was the strongest one. Overall, I think it's a decent attempt at having a hook for otherwise somewhat dry (maybe, but not really) blog posts. He is obviously going for contrast. For instance, the KRS-One quote worked well on http://bhorowitz.com/2010/05/14/why-startups-sh…

Ben Horowitz's "ben's blog" always leads off with a thematic rap lyric; it works pretty well in some cases, but fails in others.

Ok. This is something I touched on in another comment: if you're known for breaking a certain type of social convention than you can often times get away with it, without much criticism.

So this was probably normal to his blog readers but confusing to those of us who were exposed to it for the first time.

Thanks for the explanation. It made me reexamine my initial knee-jerk reaction.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#94

Post by GrooveStomp »

wheaties wrote: post #5

I've tried very hard not to be one of those people on that list. For a while I was the first, feeling completely helpless to change anything. Then someone within the company helped change some of that for me. Now I've matured to the point where I can objectively look at this company and realize it's a mismatch between my professional goals and the role that they would have me play. Quite simply it's not a software co…

Your last line represent my sentiments exactly. It's easy to get lost in the day-to-day and fail to view things objectively. Every factoid like this helps me to keep an objective view - and to keep on my career path.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#96

Post by TheSOB88 »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #91
DuncanIdaho wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To give you more detail. Addict is never really cured. Once you're through with addiction, the cravings are there for life. Whenever you need to release your steam the craving for drug kicks back in. My mentee is coping with that through writing, so sometimes he will not come to work on time - because he's setting his mind straight. So our agreement is that I don't care about his schedule - as long as his work is don…

I'm 100% with you on your goal, it's a noble act to mentor someone with the spirit that you appear to be applying. However, it sounds like you are giving them preferential treatment. You say it's just different, but then if those differences aren't available to others they might also advantage it is a preferential treatment. I guess one could argue it's not preferential in that you'd give the same assistance to anoth…

Will you quit arguing over such petty differences?! Jesus Christ! People view the world differently, so of course they'll apply different meanings to the same words, and even to the same concepts.

You said he's not wrong, and you're just arguing over semantics. Why argue? Why?

Sorry for not keeping my post cold and logical and HNish, but that's the problem: you're being robotic here and arguing just to argue.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#97

Post by flashgordon »

rdl wrote: post #33
flashgordon wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really black and white as that? Would you still hire a genius if his actions were unethical on purpose just on the off streak that he might (or even has) produced 10x the wealth/value/code/output as an average engineer?

It really depends on the person, his flaws, and the role. Roger the Coke Fiend actually seems like he'd be manageable as a part-timer: keep him on the bench, and if you have a cool 72h burst for him to do, especially if the consequences of his failure are not bad in any case. A dull but productive and reliable guy makes a great accountant. It's all about the specifics. For someone unethical, I'd be reluctant to do mo…

Definitely. I think at the end of the day, Id still be wary of lack of ethics (or professionalism) regardless of an uber IQ (or HQ - Hackability Quotient!). While there may be a lot of value from this person, the costs of managing would certainly be high as well (from the point of view of ensuring there are no negative effects - both tangible and on team morale)...

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#98

Post by sophacles »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #92
sophacles wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is differentiating that the past was a problem rather than the present. See, if the guy was a 37yo rookie because of current, actively on-going problems, then the past would still not matter, but there would be good reason to be wary. So finding out that the thing is in the past is an exercise in finding out enough to dismiss qualms. You are being disingenuous btw -- this is not like the gender question at all.

>You are being disingenuous btw -- this is not like the gender question at all. I beg to differ. Could you provide some reasoning? >but there would be good reason to be wary If you're not discriminating then it doesn't matter if they're a current drug addict, a past drug addict, partner of a drug addict - you judge them solely on their performance at work. I say discriminate.

You are disingenuous because you are trying to change the discussion from "does not get preferential treatment" to "is not the subject of discrimination". You realize these are different right? (First clue: there are different words with different definitions and connotations involved).

As for why it is not like the gender question: asking why a 37yo is doing entry level work is asking about things which it can reasonably assumed to be direct consequences of the applicants choices in life. Preselecting on gender is selection based on something the applicant has almost no control over (excluding the extremely tiny portion of post-op transgenders).

Edit: also I'm not blanket saying discrimination is bad, some types of discrimination are OK some aren't. For instance, discriminating based on "this applicant doesn't have the required skills" is perfectly reasonable. Any attempt to claim an all or nothing approach on a vague notion such as discrimination is nearly the definition of disingenuous, so please don't try and play stupid games with that either.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#99

Post by pbhjpbhj »

TheSOB88 wrote: post #96
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm 100% with you on your goal, it's a noble act to mentor someone with the spirit that you appear to be applying. However, it sounds like you are giving them preferential treatment. You say it's just different, but then if those differences aren't available to others they might also advantage it is a preferential treatment. I guess one could argue it's not preferential in that you'd give the same assistance to anoth…

Will you quit arguing over such petty differences?! Jesus Christ! People view the world differently, so of course they'll apply different meanings to the same words, and even to the same concepts. You said he's not wrong, and you're just arguing over semantics. Why argue? Why? Sorry for not keeping my post cold and logical and HNish, but that's the problem: you're being robotic here and arguing just to argue.

>Will you quit arguing over such petty differences?! Jesus Christ! People view the world differently

Off topic but WRT your response - "people see the world differently" but apparently my fixation on truth isn't allowed?

On topic, why argue? He says that he's not discriminating but he describes discrimination. I simply wanted to point out that apparent contradiction.

Discrimination is some sort of bete noire of corporate society but I find it quite silly to suggest that we should not discriminate for people because of the peculiarities of their personal situations. If you find that robotic I find your response curious but I suspect you won't meet an enquiry about it well so feel free to move on to one of the other 10 million or so comment threads of the day.

>of course they'll apply different meanings to the same words, and even to the same concepts

If you use the same words to mean something else then we need to converse more to establish that which you are trying to communicate.

Re: When Smart People are Bad Employees

#100

Post by j_baker »

alnayyir wrote: post #63
edw519 wrote: post #54

Reading the section entitled, "The Jerk," got me to wondering if OP will be ever write the obvious follow-up post, "Why We Promote So Many Jerks". I have done work for over 100 companies ranging from SMB to large enterprises. Independently (I'll tell you why in a moment) I just made a list of the 10 biggest assholes I ever met the other day. Eight of them were the #1 person in one of those companies. Seven of them ar…

Sociopathy and narcissism are overrepresented amongst executives. Smart people (as meant in the post) usually like to discover (scientists) or create (engineers, writers, etc.) things. They don't have to achieve power for power's sake in order to be happy. Thus, they aren't as well represented amongst executives in established companies because that form of achievement isn't something they valued.

Not to mention that these people have the chutzpah to get what they want. They're always successful in the short term, which means that they've already gained influence by the time anyone figures it out. And when they do, that person gets canned as an example to keep the others in line.
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