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I've seen similar patterns elsewhere: company X brings on powerful, smart, and egotistical person Y, who browbeats others into believing their pet project Z has
by candu 11y ago
I've seen similar patterns elsewhere: company X brings on powerful, smart, and egotistical person Y, who browbeats others into believing their pet project Z has to be top priority; those who disagree with Y leave Y's team (or perhaps leave X altogether); groupthink takes hold, and this perception of priority becomes reality; groupthink mutates into sunk cost fallacy to convince everyone to keep going.
This process is often reinforced with incentive structures:
- raised salaries for everyone working on Z;
- higher performance bonuses offered to top performers on Z;
- greater social cachet for those working on Z (more mentions in Q&A sessions, presentations, etc.; more marketing punch; more opportunities for advancement; air of secrecy; etc.)
Once the incentive structures take hold, even smarter employees have rational reasons to perpetuate Z.
- gamesbrainiac 11y agoUnderstood, but its not that google went social that was a problem, it was that they had no vision about how to do it in the first place. They perfectly executed their vision to create a social network, but people already had that. It has little to do with egos and everything to do with bad planning and a panicked knee-jerk response to the crisis at hand.