Talent Distribution

Yesterday’s article brought two groups of readers regarding their salaries and positions.

One group of readers think they have done a lot but didn’t get compensated properly.

The other group think they don’t get paid fairly because they don’t have a GOOD and Nice manager.

What is a Good and Nice manager?

A good manager is competent enough to get $$ for the team; a nice manager shares the $$ with his direct.

There are also readers who are managers and entrepreneurs. On their side they often complain there is no one good employee to hire.

If you look at the situation from a bystander’s view, it is just a result of the distribution of talents in the society.

In each generation, there is always a small percent of people that are good, like 1%, but the rest is so-so. Similarly, nice people are only a small fraction of the population.

As a result, it is very rare to meet someone who is both GOOD and NICE.

I used to work in a large corporation. There are few thousand employees In Headquarters, about 1% are V.P and above. Out of everyone I met in Headquarter, I haven’t seen anyone who is good but stuck on a level where he is not supposed to be.

If he is as good as a VP, no way he is below a director. If he is as good as a director, no way he is below a manager.

If you see things from the perspective of the head of my corp, you will see he is already allocating talents to the best he can. Most of the talented people are being correctly promoted.

There are always talents in this world / country. But how many are in your industry? How many are in your corporation?

Out of the two dozen or so VP in my old corp, in terms of competency, they are definitely top 200 among the few thousands in the Headquarters. But that is still not enough to resolve lots of complex problems they face in their daily jobs.

In terms of virtues, out of those VPs no more than 2 is both GOOD and NICE.

Even if you are lucky enough to have such a person to be your manager, he will likely get promoted soon. Then you are likely to have a “normal” person to be your manager next.

Lots of people are in despair not because they have bad luck, but because they rely too much on their manager or employee to carry them.