Month: April 2023

The Talent Load Fallacy

On a summer night in 2010, all eyes were on a Boys and Girls Club in Connecticut.

The gym there was filled with TV cameras. Studio lights aimed their glare on two chairs in the center of the room.

On one chair sat veteran sports reporter Jim Gray. On the other sat LeBron James.

James was a transcendent talent. Dubbed “The Chosen One” on a Sports Illustrated cover as a high school junior, he had made the leap to the National Basketball Association as a teenager. And he had become the face of basketball before he could even legally drink alcohol.

By the time he set foot in that Boys and Girls Club, James had already claimed a league scoring title, been named an All Star six times, and won two Most Valuable Player awards. Pundits were starting to compare him to Michael Jordan — who was widely considered the best basketball player of all time.

But Jordan had something James did not. Championship rings.

Jordan had been to the NBA Finals six times in his career. His Chicago Bulls had hoisted the championship trophy after each appearance, and Jordan had claimed Finals Most Valuable Player.

James had only been to the championship series once. And his Cleveland Cavaliers failed to win a single Finals game.

Now, LeBron James was a free agent, with the option to sign a lucrative contract wherever he pleased. Would he stay loyal to Cleveland? Or would he set off for greener pastures?

That’s what this TV special — dubbed The Decision — was about. After much speculation, James would finally spill the beans.

Sporting a lavender and white dress shirt, James turned to the TV cameras and announced his intent.

In the fall, I’m going to take my talents to South Beach and join the Miami Heat.

And with those words, the sporting landscape changed.

For not only was James heading to Miami, but he had left some money on the table to do so. By signing a contract below the market rate, James enabled the Heat to sign even more top-end talent.

Miami used that money to lure another star player from the Toronto Raptors, and to re-sign their best player. Their roster was now loaded.

With great fanfare, James had coordinated the launch of a superteam.

Days after The Decision, the Miami Heat hosted a buzzy event at their arena to introduce their new signees. James took the mic and told attendees that the Heat would win Not one, not two, not three, not four, not five, not six championships. The crowd roared.

The implication was clear. James had moved to Miami for one reason — to clear the last hurdle between him and Michael Jordan. If he could win the next seven championships, he’d be considered the greatest ever. That was all he was chasing.

Perhaps the man nicknamed King James thought his moves that summer would be enough. The hard part was over, the titles and accolades would come rolling in, and he’d be revered in all corners.

That’s not what happened.

Back in Ohio, fans revolted at his betrayal. Many burned their Cavaliers jerseys with James’ name on it, and videos of the infernos appeared on the internet. When the Heat traveled to Cleveland, the response was so hostile that the arena needed extra security.

And many NBA fans — and longtime Michael Jordan fans — actively rooted against James, hoping his perceived shortcut to accolades would fail.

The doubters got their wish the following summer. The Heat did make the NBA Finals, but they lost to the Dallas Mavericks. James was thoroughly outplayed by Dallas’ Dirk Nowitzki in that series, and he faced intense ridicule afterward.

It appeared that The Decision had backfired bigtime.

As I write this, I’ve been a professional for the better part of 12 years.

I don’t play basketball, and I don’t find myself in front of the cameras. But I’ve worked in multiple industries for various employers.

These companies have all had homegrown talent. They’ve hired unproven commodities like me and let us grow into our roles. They’ve often promoted from within, giving new responsibilities to those already familiar with their operations and culture.

But every now and then, I’ve caught wind of a splashy hire or two. Someone with a star-studded resume, newly arrived from a big-name company.

I welcome these developments. But not unconditionally.

For I remember the story of LeBron James and the Miami Heat. I know that assembling a superteam, Avengers style, doesn’t always guarantee success.

Indeed, recent corporate history is littered with missteps like these. JC Penney, Bed Bath and Beyond, and Twitter — among others — have recently faltered under the watch of ballyhooed executives.

I don’t rejoice in such carnage. But I am aware of what it represents. And I hope that those within my orbit are as well.

You see, the mixed returns of the Talent Load strategy represent more than luck. They demonstrate the folly of a prevalent myth.

Talent is not finite. It’s not zero sum. And it is far from guaranteed.

Indeed, talent is more like the yeast starter for a loaf of bread. When it’s given time to cultivate and mesh with its surrounding environment, it can grow into something special. But it needs that time and space to thrive.

This is a self-evident truth. But it’s an inconvenient one for our modern world — where the demand for instant results is high.

So, we keep going to the well. We rely on the abilities of a proven few. And, in doing so, we ignore the potential of many others.

That does no one any good.

There’s an old episode of Family Guy where the show’s protagonist — Peter Griffin — buys volcano insurance from a traveling salesman.

The whole thing was a gag. It was proof Griffin was so dim-witted that he’d throw his money at just about anything.

But the bit only works because of some common knowledge. Namely, that there is insurance coverage for just about anything.

One of those just about anything coverages is called Key Man Insurance. It’s meant to protect a company financially if one of its core employees is incapacitated.

In a sense, this coverage seems prudent. If top talent is taken out, a business might lose its edge — financially and otherwise. Insurance protection could be a worthy hedge against that risk.

But this line of thought can corrode an entire organization. It can give top executives a God complex, inflating their sense of self-importance. And it can create a de facto glass ceiling for everyone in the organization with a lower title.

Whether these employees are mid-level managers or entry level associates, they seemingly don’t matter. They’re the worker bees. The talent is upstairs, out of reach.

This might not be entirely true, of course. But actions can feed perceptions. And every move to quickly assemble a superteam and encase it in Key Man Insurance protection — well, it tells a story.

It’s a bleak narrative. But not an inevitable one.

Indeed, corporate leaders can flip the script. They can view their workforce as diamonds in the rough, rather than cogs in a wheel. They can commit to development and build a pipeline to the top.

And those in that workforce can showcase their potential. They can advocate for themselves, lead by example, and shine radiantly when the lights are brightest. Through will and determination, they can douse cold water on the myth of finite talent.

These are small changes, with minimal impact on their own. But once combined, they can turn the Talent Load fallacy on its head. They can forge a more equitable and promising future for all.

That’s what we’re all after. So, let’s go get it.

Thoughtful Idiocy

As the sun set on an October day in Texas, anticipation rose.

The Texas Rangers were about to take the field for their first home playoff game in three years. With a win, they’d advance to the next round of baseball’s postseason.

The ballpark was filled with 50,000 fans, all waving red and white rally towels. And I was one of them.

I’d scored my seat thanks to some good fortune. There had been a lottery for the opportunity to buy playoff tickets, and my name had been selected. All around me, fans who had come by their tickets the same way were remarking how fortunate they felt.

The game started. The roar of the crowd was deafening. And the view from down the third base line was honestly not all that bad.

But then, in the second inning, a beer vendor started walking up and down the aisles. He was directly in my line of sight as I looked out toward home plate where the action was.

I craned my neck to look around him, knowing he’d be gone in a moment.

But then a fan approached him in the aisle and ordered two beers. The fan, wearing the opposing team’s jersey, stood there while the vendor tried to serve him.

It was as if the fan was in the concession stand line. But he wasn’t. He was blocking the view of hundreds of Rangers fans. Fans who hadn’t paid hundreds of dollars to stare at him buying beer.

Eventually, some of those Rangers fans had enough. They asked the opposing fan to crouch down while he waited, so that they could watch the game.

The opposing fan replied by threatening to drop his pants. He then verbally abused all of the Rangers fans in the section, oblivious to the fact that he was vastly outnumbered.

It was all so childish, so comically immature. But it left an impact.

I’d paid top dollar to see playoff baseball. But my enduring memory of that experience are the actions of an idiot.

What were you thinking?

These words fill me with dread.

When I hear them uttered, it means that someone has just done something idiotic. And they’re getting raked over the coals for it.

You see, the answer to this phrase is self-evident. The target of wrath couldn’t possibly have been thinking. If they had, they wouldn’t have done something this dumb.

This critique itself doesn’t make me cringe. But what it symbolizes does.

It means there’s already been collateral damage from the idiot’s actions. It’s the ballpark fiasco all over again.

I feel for all those impacted by this self-absorbed behavior. Those who are essentially victimized by thoughtlessness.

And I seek to never be that thoughtless person. I yearn to never find myself rightfully called to the carpet.

Still, such plans are far from foolproof.

Back at the ballpark, behind that obnoxious fan in the aisle, a duel was going on.

Well, more like a series of them.

Each time a player strode to home plate and dug their cleats into the dirt, a new confrontation would begin. A high stakes battle between the batter and the pitcher.

The batter was looking for a pitch he could hit hard. And the pitcher was looking to make the batter miss.

Occasionally, one of these combatants would make the other one look foolish. The batter would drive a pitch over the heart of home plate to the outfield wall, 400 feet away. The pitcher would fool the batter into swinging at a ball in the dirt. Both of those things happened in this playoff game.

But sometimes, the pitcher or batter would do exactly what they wanted — and end up with nothing to show for it.

That was ultimately how the game got away from the Rangers.

In the sixth inning, with his team down by a 2-0 score, Texas starting pitcher Martin Perez returned to the pitching mound. He gave up base hits to the first two batters — both on pitches below the batter’s knees.

The ball was thrown where he wanted it each time. But it didn’t yield the desired outcome.

Perez was pulled from the game. Both batters he gave up hits to would ultimately come around to score when his replacement gave up a home run.

As I write this, Perez has yet to start another postseason game. Surely, he must think back on that night and wonder how it got away from him.

Truth be told, Perez pitched decently well in that game. His intensity, focus, and effort were where they needed to be.

But the results belied his best intentions. And for years, that disconnect cast a shadow over his career.

There’s a term that defines Perez’s predicament that October evening.

Thoughtful idiocy.

Perez was seeking to command the game. But he still ended up sinking his team’s chances.

Thoughtful idiocy is a bitter pill to swallow. It’s insidious, as it takes a good thing and turns it bad.

We are primed to be the opposite of that fan waiting for beer in the middle of the aisle. We’re supposed to be selfless, conscientious, and committed to the cause.

It’s tantalizing to tie outcomes to these attributes. Act absent-minded and suffer the consequences. Operate with thoughtfulness and reap the benefits.

But that’s not how it works in practice.

In truth, we can try too hard. We can push too far. We can get beat at our own game.

Sometimes this looks like Martin Perez on the pitching mound that October night. Minimal mistakes yield lopsided results — with thousands watching in disappointment.

Other times, it can be a bit more subtle. It might mean pushing ahead on a work project without getting the requisite sign-off. It might mean ramping up a workout regimen faster than your body can handle. It might mean trying a bit too hard to reconnect with long-lost acquaintances.

I know all these mistakes. For I have made them before.

That my heart was in the right place mattered little. The results told the story.

I was an idiot. Not for doing too little. But for doing too much, without even considering a sanity check.

You’ve got to be part strategist, part psychologist.

This is the unofficial job description for a baseball manager.

It’s only fitting. In a sport where 9 players take the field each night for six months, it’s a requisite skill. Especially when you consider how difficult it is to hit a baseball.

Yes, great baseball managers have mastered the art of nuance. They get their teams in the right tactical positions to win. But they also get their players in the right headspace to thrive.

The best managers must remain active without overacting. The must be thoughtful without overthinking.

Such skills are not relegated to baseball. Many coaches in other sports display similar nuance. So do many supervisors in office settings. And many parents in households across America.

Nuanced thought and measured action can help just about anyone thrive at their role. They can avoid the polarizing extremes of absent mindedness and of taking things too far. They can avoid both supreme dumbness and thoughtful idiocy.

But we can’t get to this point right out of the gates. Experience is an unrivaled teacher in this endeavor. And blunders sometimes provide the most vivid lessons.

When I recount my moments of thoughtful idiocy, I first feel humiliated. How could I have been so foolish? How could I have gotten things so wrong?

But then, I remember to give myself some grace. To treat the incident as a building block. To show the same level of dedication next time, but with a bit more restraint.

This is the roadmap to a better tomorrow. For me. For all of us.

But we must commit to it.

We must not bury our thoughtful idiocy. We must instead have the courage to address it and iterate off it.

There’s nothing dumb about that.

Out of the Shadows

It was a beautiful afternoon.

Outside my window, sunlight radiated through blue skies. The branches of the trees barely budged in the light breeze.

It was one of those mid-winter days in Texas that just begged everyone to get outside. To enjoy the temperate conditions before they gave way to the muggy slog of spring and the searing heat of summer.

But on this day, I was not heeding the call. On this day, I remained indoors.

I was recuperating from a recent ankle surgery. And I had been ordered to wear a protective boot whenever I was away from home.

Getting that boot on my foot was quite a challenge. Walking in that boot was another. And cleaning that boot was no picnic, either.

It seemed prudent to avoid all of this when possible. So, I tended to stay indoors — even on beautiful days like these.

Although I craved the light, I remained in the shadows.

That protective boot now sits in my closet, collecting dust.

But my memory doesn’t.

I might have recovered from my injury. But all around me, I see plenty of others amid their own tribulations.

At the ballgame, the grocery store, and the airport, I see the marks of recuperation. People are sporting slings, crutches, and protective boots. And I feel for them.

This is not a Baader-Meinhof situation. That happened when I purchased my SUV, and then suddenly noticed dozens of others like it.

No, I had noticed people with disabilities before. But where I’d once gotten out of the way of them, I now did what I could to help.

I would hold a door open for them or give up my seat to them. All with a knowing nod.

I understood their plight. And I wanted to lessen the burden.

In late 1989, the Berlin Wall came down.

For a generation, the treacherous concrete barrier had defined the divide between East and West, between communism and democracy. But now, it was gone. And the USSR would soon follow.

The Cold War was over.

I was playing with Matchbox cars and watching Sesame Street when this occurred. I understood little of what was going on.

But now, as an adult, I frame my life story around this event. I was born during the Cold War but grew up after it.

This narrative is factual. But it omits another seismic event from that time.

In mid 1990, the United States Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act. The legislation afforded protections to anyone facing an impairment.

In one fell swoop, it brought those with disabilities out of the shadows and into the light.

Remnants of this legislation were everywhere during my youth. Public facilities were being retrofitted to comply with the law. Public announcements were educating the masses on the accommodations.

And yet, I couldn’t quite relate. I was able-bodied and had no reason to believe I wouldn’t be. This wasn’t my fight.

So, I continued to ignore the narrative around me. I would pay no mind to the revolution at home, and instead wax poetic about events that occurred far afield.

It would take three decades for me to change my tune.

When the COVID pandemic hit in 2020, we got a glimpse of the shadows. Confined by lockdowns, business closures, and mask mandates, we all got to see how the 26 percent of Americans with disabilities live.

Like many, I loathed this experience. I did my best to get some distance from it as the pandemic receded.

But I could never fully escape.

About two years after the COVID shutdowns, I was to meet my family in Houston for a vacation. A few days before the trip, my mother informed me that she would be showing up in the Bayou City in a wheelchair.

I knew my mother had been dealing with some knee issues. But I was still caught off-guard by this announcement.

As a longtime Texan, I knew my state wasn’t the easiest to navigate by wheelchair. And I spent hours ticking through contingency plans.

What if we needed to change up our seating at the rodeo? What if the Johnson Space Center had exhibits that were only accessible by stairs?

Everything ended up working out just fine. But I remained hyper-aware of the challenges facing those with disabilities.

Then I went under the knife and experienced those challenges firsthand.

As I navigated that time in the shadows, post-procedure, I was introspective. I was ashamed of how badly I’d overlooked those with disabilities for so much of my life. And I was determined to do better.

I’ve lived by that creed ever since.

I’m determined to show compassion to those with disabilities, helping them emerge from the shadows. And I’m hoping my actions inspire others to do the same.

This might seem like a noble quest. But it has its challenges. And perhaps not the ones you might think.

The Washington Post has employed a slew of high-profile journalists over the years. Perhaps the most recent of these is Taylor Lorenz.

Before joining the Post, Lorenz made her name writing about internet culture for the New York Times. As the online world has evolved in hyper speed, Lorenz has covered every bit of it — garnering both acclaim and outrage along the way.

If you follow Lorenz on social media though, you’ll find something else. Namely, a long-running critique of loosened COVID pandemic restrictions.

In much of American society, this point is a non-starter. The worst of the pandemic has passed, medical interventions are now available, and a yearning for normalcy percolate.

But Lorenz is either immunocompromised or carrying the flag of those who are. She will not stop criticizing the world for “moving on.”

I can see where Lorenz is coming from, to a degree. There are some similarities between being injured and immunocompromised — particularly when it comes to societal isolation.

It was frustrating when I found myself alone in the shadows. Still, I never once expected others to stay inside during my recuperation, just because I was deprived the outdoors. That would have been an unreasonable request.

It’s no more feasible for the immunocompromised to demand that the world remain perpetually locked down. It’s several bridges too far.

So yes, Lorenz’s advocacy should remain off the table here. But so should the status quo.

It’s time for us to embrace the spirit of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It’s time to provide reasonable accommodation to those we’ve banished to the shadows.

That means awareness. It means compassion.

It means giving a hand up, but not necessarily a handout.

Making this compromise might seem daunting. But those with disabilities are making compromises of their own too.

We owe it to them to meet them halfway.

Manufactured Rebellion

Silicon Valley.

The string of suburbs nestled toward the bottom of the San Francisco Bay is where the titans of computing, the Internet, and social media are based. It’s where a glut of venture capital and private equity firms have set up shop.

It might seem this sun-speckled stretch of California paradise has always been the epicenter of technology. But back in the early 1980s, the seat of power was 3,000 miles east.

You see, back then, Steve Jobs wasn’t a household name. Elon Musk was a secondary school student in South Africa. Mark Zuckerberg wasn’t even born yet.

Business computing was king. And there was but one behemoth in business computing — IBM.

The sleepy suburban enclave of Armonk — some 35 miles north of New York City — was the heart of IBM’s corporate functions. It’s where the accountants maintained their balance sheets. It’s where the financial analysts did their modeling. It’s where executives maintained their cushy offices.

But not all of IBM’s operations were based there. Some 1,300 miles south in Boca Raton, another unit was hard at work.

These employees paid little attention to the details of what was going on up in Armonk. And the bigwigs at headquarters had precious little line of sight into what was happening down in Florida.

This was all by design.

The Boca unit was IBM’s skunkworks. It was the space where IBM-ers could innovate, free of the constraints of the IBM brand banner. It was where IBM could attempt to disrupt its own business.

IBM wasn’t the first company to try its hand at skunkworks.

Lockheed Martin introduced the concept as it developed weapons in secrecy during World War II. Over the years, other companies followed its lead.

However, IBM had a novel use for its skunkworks setup — Manufactured Rebellion.

Yes, the team in Boca was made up of IBM employees aiming to disrupt IBM’s business.

The company knew that its stronghold was far from assured over time. Technology changes. Consumption patterns shift.

If IBM were to wait before reacting to these changes, it would be too late. The only shot at longevity would be to stay on the cutting edge. To diversify the company portfolio to include the innovations of tomorrow and the strategic strengths of today.

That’s what Manufactured Rebellion was all about. And it yielded the Personal Computer for IBM.

We might overlook that point these days, with Apple and Microsoft dominating the PC market. But the skunkworks likely helped IBM stay relevant for far longer than the company otherwise would have been.

And thanks to a Harvard Business Review writeup, the IBM skunkworks continues to cast a long shadow.

Indeed, Manufactured Rebellion is all the rage in the technology world. Companies left and right are trying to disrupt themselves, even as they reach the pinnacle of success.

This is how Apple ended up making smartphones. It’s what got Netflix into streaming. It’s why Google’s parent company has a division called “other bets,” fueled by an incubator called X.

It’s also the reason companies in other industries — automaking, hospitality, and finance — are rebranding themselves as tech companies.

Manufactured Rebellion is all around us. And to some degree, within us.

You see, these companies have an outsize influence on our behavior. Consider it the halo effect.

Starbucks once convinced us to pay $4 for a cup of coffee. Disney persuaded us that happily ever after was inevitable. And Apple, Google, and Netflix have directed us to shake up today in favor of tomorrow.

So, we seek to disrupt ourselves.

We cast off old routines. We reinvent our style. We shake up our professional identity.

We do all this for the same reason as IBM. To stay ahead of the curve.

But are we getting more than we bargained for?

Early in the film Catch Me If You Can, FBI agent Carl Hanratty enters a French prison, seeking to take custody of a prisoner there.

The prisoner — Frank Abagnale, Jr. — had pulled off a string of confidence crimes. Hanratty’s mission was to bring him back to the United States to face charges.

Abagnale had been a confident and quick-witted man throughout his crime spree. But in the dark confines of a jail cell, he appeared young and frightened.

After making a feeble attempt at an escape, he made a frail request to Hanratty.

Take me home, Carl.

Abagnale had brought all kinds of Manufactured Rebellion into his life. He had posed as a lawyer and an airline pilot. He had forged millions of dollars worth of checks. And he had stayed one step ahead of the law throughout most of these escapades.

But now, he had been stripped of all that. Reacquainted with his real identity, all he wanted to do was go home.

Most of us are not confidence artists like Abagnale. Our journey probably won’t include a stop in a French jail.

But we can relate to him a bit too viscerally.

You see, our penchant for self-disruption has its benefits.

Switching jobs yields increased earning power. Moving homes yields enhanced surroundings. Changing diets yields improved health.

But Manufactured Rebellion also has its costs.

If we keep changing for change’s sake, we start chasing ghosts. We’re always in pursuit. Never comfortable. Never satisfied.

We lose sight of who we are on the quest to find out who we could be.

This is a basic fact. And yet, it always seems to catch us off guard — just as it did Abagnale.

It shouldn’t.

For despite its bravado, Manufactured Rebellion often fails to deliver. For every Netflix stream or iPhone, there are dozens of failed corporate pivots. Heck, even the flagship PC from IBM’s skunkworks ultimately fell short.

We can’t expect our success rate to be any better. For we are human.

Unlike billion-dollar corporations, we bear the brunt of disruption. We feel every bit of the ups and downs.

And while brand irrelevance is disastrous for any company, the loss of our identity can be downright tragic.

So, let’s turn this ship around. Let’s stop needlessly putting ourselves in jeopardy. And let’s be more thoughtful about when and where we change things up.

This might not give us the sugar rush of Manufactured Rebellion. But it spares us the inevitable crash that follows.

And that’s not nothing.