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> My interviews at the latter place eventually devolved into basic IQ tests... The problem is that this doesn't scale with talent and/or experience. Industrial

> My interviews at the latter place eventually devolved into basic IQ tests... The problem is that this doesn't scale with talent and/or experience. Industrial psychology has consistently found that IQ is a better predictor of job performance than experience. The reason being is that intelligence is defined as the ability to acquire knowledge and skills. Intelligent people literally learn faster than others. The skill acquired by a low IQ in five years is often surpassed by a high IQ person with a few months of experience. [1]https://www.jstor.org/stable/20182140?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/20182140?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co...

winter_blue 7y ago
> Industrial psychology has consistently found that IQ is a better predictor of job performance than experience. If hiring managers are aware of this, then it might be a good idea to apply to Mensa. If you're able to get in, maybe putting "Mensa" down on your resume isn't that bad of a thing. (I've always felt it would make one come off as a douche, but maybe that's not so true.)
- lmkg 7y ago
  Hiring managers should also be aware that in the United States, Supreme Court precedent makes the use of general intelligence tests for hiring legally fraught because they can produce racially-biased outcomes.
- IshKebab 7y ago
  Definitely comes off as douchy. I wouldn't discount someone for it but it would definitely make me wary of them (probably a know-it-all who doesn't listen to other people and always knows best).
- perl4ever 7y ago
  My opinion of Mensa was formed by someone who told me about how, when she was a hiring manager, she once had an applicant who made a point of belonging to Mensa and didn't seem to have anything else she was proud of or had accomplished. That doesn't mean I am necessarily on board with the fashionable view that IQ is meaningless, but I think to the extent there are people whose IQ is disconnected from their abilities/achievements, it's going to be the ones who are preoccupied with it. So I would think belonging to a high-IQ society would send the wrong message.
blub 7y ago
You cited a publication called "Intelligence Is the Best Predictor of Job Performance", but funnily enough there's also one called "Intelligence Is Not the Best Predictor of Job Performance", which one year later claims that the former one is flawed. There's also this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/, which says "Supporters of IQ testing have been quick to point to correlations between IQ and job performance as evidence of test validity. A closer look at the data and results, however, suggests a rather murkier picture." > The skill acquired by a low IQ in five years is often surpassed by a high IQ person with a few months of experience. This looks wrong to me, most things take more than a few months to learn.
wutbrodo 7y ago
I'm probably a stronger believer in this than most, which is why it was easy for me to follow the evidence for our narrow case where it led. But you only need a weaker form of this to explain the experience I had recruiting at that company. All it takes to be a good engineer at the lower levels is a sufficiently high IQ/creative problem-solving ability. Put someone like that under the mentorship of someone who's learned good engineering habits and (barring severe behavioral problems), you'll have a pretty great junior engineer in a few months. Otoh,Experience and other habits and knowledge do become more relevant at higher levels, only because the responsibilities of the job shift and grow, such that you can do a lot more damage in the "learn by exploration" period of becoming good at something by just being really intelligent and learning on the job. I currently work with a bunch of physics and math and CS PhDs, people who are likely as intelligent as I am or more, but I'm a lot more equipped for our job because I'm applying that intelligence in the context of understanding how engineering systems work, at both a technical and personal level. There are tons of engineering habits that are second nature to me that never occur to them; if they shadowed me closely and I dedicated time to explaining the reason I do every little thing I do, then they'd pick up those habits in the same way junior engineers do. That is to say, as one would expect, the relative supremacy of IQ over other skills like conscientiousness (or yes, experience) diminishes at the higher levels. Everyone I work with would be considered "really smart" by any reasonable measure, but it's not purely the smartest who are the most effective anymore, the way it was when we were entry level.

winter_blue 7y ago

> Industrial psychology has consistently found that IQ is a better predictor of job performance than experience. If hiring managers are aware of this, then it might be a good idea to apply to Mensa. If you're able to get in, maybe putting "Mensa" down on your resume isn't that bad of a thing. (I've always felt it would make one come off as a douche, but maybe that's not so true.)

lmkg 7y ago
Hiring managers should also be aware that in the United States, Supreme Court precedent makes the use of general intelligence tests for hiring legally fraught because they can produce racially-biased outcomes.
IshKebab 7y ago
Definitely comes off as douchy. I wouldn't discount someone for it but it would definitely make me wary of them (probably a know-it-all who doesn't listen to other people and always knows best).
perl4ever 7y ago
My opinion of Mensa was formed by someone who told me about how, when she was a hiring manager, she once had an applicant who made a point of belonging to Mensa and didn't seem to have anything else she was proud of or had accomplished. That doesn't mean I am necessarily on board with the fashionable view that IQ is meaningless, but I think to the extent there are people whose IQ is disconnected from their abilities/achievements, it's going to be the ones who are preoccupied with it. So I would think belonging to a high-IQ society would send the wrong message.

blub 7y ago

You cited a publication called "Intelligence Is the Best Predictor of Job Performance", but funnily enough there's also one called "Intelligence Is Not the Best Predictor of Job Performance", which one year later claims that the former one is flawed. There's also this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4557354/, which says "Supporters of IQ testing have been quick to point to correlations between IQ and job performance as evidence of test validity. A closer look at the data and results, however, suggests a rather murkier picture." > The skill acquired by a low IQ in five years is often surpassed by a high IQ person with a few months of experience. This looks wrong to me, most things take more than a few months to learn.

wutbrodo 7y ago

I'm probably a stronger believer in this than most, which is why it was easy for me to follow the evidence for our narrow case where it led. But you only need a weaker form of this to explain the experience I had recruiting at that company. All it takes to be a good engineer at the lower levels is a sufficiently high IQ/creative problem-solving ability. Put someone like that under the mentorship of someone who's learned good engineering habits and (barring severe behavioral problems), you'll have a pretty great junior engineer in a few months. Otoh,Experience and other habits and knowledge do become more relevant at higher levels, only because the responsibilities of the job shift and grow, such that you can do a lot more damage in the "learn by exploration" period of becoming good at something by just being really intelligent and learning on the job. I currently work with a bunch of physics and math and CS PhDs, people who are likely as intelligent as I am or more, but I'm a lot more equipped for our job because I'm applying that intelligence in the context of understanding how engineering systems work, at both a technical and personal level. There are tons of engineering habits that are second nature to me that never occur to them; if they shadowed me closely and I dedicated time to explaining the reason I do every little thing I do, then they'd pick up those habits in the same way junior engineers do. That is to say, as one would expect, the relative supremacy of IQ over other skills like conscientiousness (or yes, experience) diminishes at the higher levels. Everyone I work with would be considered "really smart" by any reasonable measure, but it's not purely the smartest who are the most effective anymore, the way it was when we were entry level.