"The Heretic: Specifically, he builds his case that the company is hopeless and run by a bunch of morons." Statistically speaking, the employee is probably rig

"The Heretic: Specifically, he builds his case that the company is hopeless and run by a bunch of morons." Statistically speaking, the employee is probably right. But at most companies, building a case for this is an exercise in tautology. Maybe take him seriously and at least make it look like you are being proactive about his issues. "The Flake: ... he completed the project in 72 hours." He did two weeks of coding in 3 days. If he doesn't show up for the next two weeks, and the product had no major flaws, who cares? Drug addiction and mental disorder are a separate issue, in my opinion. If he is really as good as it seemed, it would have behooved the employer to get him into rehab/psychological treatment. "The Jerk: ...sounds like House M.D." WHY did you put someone with no people skills in a management position? (Senior management to boot). It makes very little sense. Someone who is a jerk isn't going to be good at managing people. A jerk could be a great individual contributor, as long as the jerk does his work correctly. I feel like it is more about making the right concessions given the individual, and making sure you don't put people into positions where their faults are amplified. An analogy to this post would be finding that a puzzle piece doesn't go where you want to put it, and therefore declaring that it is a bad puzzle piece (even though it fits somewhere else just fine).