A senior partner at a local firm told me “We only hire from the top 10%” of the class from the top 10% of law schools”. She then went on to tell me what a “pain in the rear-end” they were with their demands. Class rank, grade point average, schooling, are major hiring criteria. Hiring for experienced positions considers both achievements and advancement. Missing anything?
“It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.” –Steve Jobs. In the book ‘The Pentagon’s Brain’, Annie Jacobsen writes about the military’s most secret and powerful R&D agency in the world [DRAPA]. Most if not all technological and scientific advancement today can be traced to DRAPA. Why do I mention this? It is one of the largest gatherings of highly knowledgeable (really smart people) on the planet.
Are there particular issues associated with hiring really smart people? Is it really any different than the roulette wheel with ‘regular’ people? Let’s look at some of the characteristics associated with really smart people and how they fit in the workplace.
First, it is a natural tendency for people who are smart or experts (and these two things tend to go together) in one thing to feel they’re expert in all things. The more successful people have been in the past the worse they tend to perform when they enter a new environment. They are overconfident, less open to feedback and think everything from the past applies to the unfamiliar environment.
Jacobsen found a reoccurring theme in new hires at DRAPA. When they were exposed to other types of projects than what they were hired for but had a real ‘passion’ for they ‘migrated’ to that project sometimes without prior consent.
How much of your interview questions focus on their passions beyond the job description or their prior responsibilities? Lesson, hire them for their passions not just their smarts or accomplishments.
I have found a key to maximizing the performance of real smart people is directly related to who their manager is. Now isn’t that wonderful insight. I have not experienced any smart person that is a good manager of like-minded smart peers. Unless they are a very good manager it can turn into a ‘who’s smarter’ contest.
Good enough can be a difficult concept with this type and especially engineers. Their rationale is that, with sufficient time and resources, improvements can be made beyond the current state. Freezing designs and meeting deadlines is challenging. Someone has to be the ‘bad guy’ and hold the individual or work group to deadlines.
A few more nuances. Can they be objective in judging their work? I have not found them any different than other people except their defense is more in-depth. They are not necessarily good at ‘reading’ the non-verbal clues from others in one on one or in a group conversation. Therefore, too often they are labeled as ‘socially awkward’. They don’t feel awkward.
The old adage of asking an engineer what time it is and they tell you how the watch was made first has truth to it. When they have a passion about something they quickly become an in-depth expert on the subject. However, I have seen at times where they will seem to ‘lose interest’, even in a project. My observation is kind of ‘enough is enough’ is their thinking and they will move onto something else.
Is it wrong or a mistake to hire a really smart person? Absolutely not! Where Leaders get in trouble is when they assume because someone is really smart that will be enough. Have clear expectations for what you need of them, how you are going to evaluate them in the interview process beyond the typical job description and will they ‘fit’ the work group they will be a part of.