Brilliant Jerks Cost More Than They Are Worth

When brilliant people are managed by strong managers, those that manage to team performance rather than those that manage to individual performance, they add value by not only doing a lot of work but helping everyone else do their best work. The problem occurs when a manager is weak and the brilliant person has 'jerk' tendencies which come out unchecked. Then everyone suffers.

It is sort of like managing sociopaths, you can do it if you can set up the scoring for them such that they 'win' if the group wins. And of course that is easy to write but very hard to put into practice.

I disagree on 'adequate' though. I'll take a truly brilliant a-hole over 'adequate'. 'Adequate' means I'm often fixing their mistakes, checking up on them, making sure they stay on track, etc. I'm ok with smoothing over issues from time to time if it means I can let them run wild on the thing I hired them for.

Sometimes people are very picky because they are trying to stonewall you. They come up with review comments that might be accurate, but aren't actually intended to help the change land. Maybe they review just far enough to veto, and then you fix that and they review enough to veto again. That kind of jerk is not worth much, but it's the malintent behind the impolite behavior that is the problem. Often the person is disengaged and disinterested in their job.

Sometimes people are become defensive and difficult because they don't believe they are contributing enough compared to their past performance. I've seen a lot of people who did a lot of good work in the past, but aren't doing well now. Maybe processes changed, maybe how the team makes priorities changed, maybe technologies changed, maybe they aren't managing themselves well, maybe they are just depressed and having a hard time functioning. Maybe it's compounded because their own displayed confidence backed them into a wall, and they can't admit there's something they don't know or aren't able to do, and so they can't learn to do it. These jerks are "essential" (because they know stuff, maybe have authority), but not productive. Sometimes they stonewall to hide this.

There's jerks who have their own agenda that doesn't align with some of the people they are supposed to work with. It a matrixed organization everyone validly has independent agendas that cross with each other. Maybe they only feel personally responsible for product quality, while they are a gatekeeper for people who are supposed to deliver new functionality. Because of how authority may be setup, someone may feel trapped between two authorities (their boss and this gatekeeper) with no way to come to agreement on priorities. Usually this is a lack of understood overarching priorities from leadership. Sometimes without that in place the only way to "win" is to be difficult.

Personally I don't have a problem working with abrasive personalities so long as we truly share a goal and are working towards it. Having a group of people who really share a goal is not as common as one would hope.

Now I actively manage my "jerk" tendencies. While I still have my jerk moments, I think my co-workers realize that I'm trying not to be a jerk so they let it slide. And when I am being a jerk, they will call me out on it.