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Most talented were a russian(18 year old) and two brits(early 20's) with whom i have worked with. But i would say talent doesn't guarantee more productivity. In
by navinsylvester 8y ago
Most talented were a russian(18 year old) and two brits(early 20's) with whom i have worked with. But i would say talent doesn't guarantee more productivity. In fact in most cases it can have adverse effect on productivity.
Let me list few points:
# Tend to deviate from task and try to fix functional things which they think are not elegant engineering
# They are motivated to learn new technology so they will squeeze one without thinking about long term side effects like shipping delays and maintenance issue
# They think they will be productive working alone and mostly avoid collaboration which can be very costly down the road
# Failing to understand that trade offs to achieve business goals is a good trait to have
# Code maintenance doesn't motivate them like new shinier stuff
# Can slowly turn the business to be people dependent
# Going over board with code reuse and in the end introducing too many dependencies
- romeisendcoming 8y agoThese are shit programmers. Complexity != talent.
- navinsylvester 8y agoMost gifted talent in my experience exhibit these negative traits which impact productivity. If you have a counter point based on your experience - would love to hear that.
- sp527 8y agoI think his point is that truly intelligent people would know better than to do this because it requires more holistic thinking (i.e. accounting for the reality of other people). The person you’re describing may be intelligent in some ways, but not enough to zoom out and understand the bigger picture. Elon Musk is another good example. Someone who is so much a victim of his behavioral impulses and savior complex that he’s a catastrophically negligent leader, as recounted by Tesla employees in a recent story. I’m of the opinion that you’re not truly intelligent if you are unable to recognize and correct for your own character flaws.
- navinsylvester 8y agoThat is the subtle point i was trying to make. In most cases talented young people are easily noticed and usually given more credit than due without measuring the overall contribution to productivity. Eventually most with the tag will mellow down with experience. But when that switch slowly happens - many would hardly notice anything but a seasoned bankable asset.