I wonder if this is more about homogeneous cultural norms. If you respond to criticism the similarly to the way I do, I can predict how to provide effective cri

I wonder if this is more about homogeneous cultural norms. If you respond to criticism the similarly to the way I do, I can predict how to provide effective criticism. In a small team, i think the conventional wisdom is spot on - hire a really good cultural fit, even in favor of technical chops. In a larger organization you're inevitably going to have a wider distribution of values simply because there are more people. At a some point the organization needs to figure out how to get people to play nice together. The larger the organization, the more tolerance for variance is required. I guess if you're doing something really cool or are willing to pay a lot that can be mitigated just because you'll have a larger pool of candidates. Of course, you can't really figure out how people respond to stress until they're stressed, which happens way way after they are hired. It's probably a better heuristic to figure out how the organization can cope with wide variance norms, rather than trying to pick people that act like me.