If you reduce your talent pool intentionally and then you find you have problems filling roles, you have only yourself to blame. At large companies it may not b

If you reduce your talent pool intentionally and then you find you have problems filling roles, you have only yourself to blame. At large companies it may not be as obvious that they aren't getting the same level of talent they could have but usually the end result is a diminished capacity to execute successfully. Why should they risk? For two reasons. The best people are often not "normal". Look at some of the best coders or hardware hackers out there. Imagine if Netscape didn't hire Jamie Zawinski, would they have been as successful? When Jobs and Wozniak started Apple their previous most successful business venture was phone phreaking, selling illegal "blue boxes" that allowed people to hack the telephone network (and make free calls, incidentally). If you only want boring people then you will quickly remove some of the most talented people from consideration.