i think that's the problem: having idea people working on details. by definition they're not good at them -- it's like forcing a shape into the wrong hole. th

i think that's the problem: having idea people working on details. by definition they're not good at them -- it's like forcing a shape into the wrong hole. their powers are best used in creative positions but those sorts of positions aren't very standard or given to people just starting out, so it can be hard for them if they start out doing detail work and their difficulty with it gets the better of them and they're perceived as incompetent. even if they manage to stay afloat in the monotony, their strengths are likely to remain invisible in the detail and the higher-ups never see their potential. worst-case scenario of course, but i doubt it's rare i heard this second-hand, but supposedly IBM has a particular genius somewhere in california. he is very sloppy, is probably a night owl... but when he gets a spark of an idea, whether it be in the middle of the night, a 'task force' is summoned to jot down as much detail about the idea as possible. if that's true then IBM knows the specialty and significance of these sorts of people looking at it from another perspective, Einstein is probably the most extreme example of an idea person. but despite being terribly lazy, he was able to do many great things because he _didn't consider it work_. an idea person with a passion is something of an unstoppable force funnily, the lazyness is likely due to the overhead of the mind organizing data into a format which allows specialized (sensory/intuitive,) instant retrieval later on. the overhead is significant, but the gift is powerful. it's present in varying forms and degrees in different people and in extreme cases (like these 'brilliant' guys) is risky like min-maxing i've found that jungian psychological theories such as MBTI http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator provide a good lexicon with which to think about these sorts of things