So recently I saw a H I L A R I O U S post on Quora: What do all of the Mediocre People Do In Silicon Valley? I was so pleased by this that I decided to write yet another blog on what I am now calling Elite Computing. As a matter of fact this is a moniker that I cannot claim. Someone who I had a long discussion with said and I quote, ” I like the fact that you talk about Elite Computing and acknowledge people when they are smart.” They went on to discuss the differences between The Valley and almost everywhere else was that in The Valley you better know and show your smart or else.
A while a go I wrote a blog on Social Darwinism and Software Development. Lets take an excerpt from this Quora article that appears to be a little more palatible:
“They work in less important roles at larger companies. Certain parts of Yahoo, AOL, Oracle, Microsoft have lots of these people. The companies actually make reasonably productive use of them. They generally have structures in place that prevent them from doing too much damage and make sure they are always making forward progress, even if it’s slow”
Then if you go down in the comments there is the usual bitching about “Why do you have to have over confidence? So what IF just WHAT IF? The same pathetic atitude existed in 1) The Military 2) The Police Force 3) Sports.
Stronger Better Faster More. You want a 1x return on your investment or you want a 10x? Think about that the next time some of the top performers seem overly intense, passionate or crazy.
It put the whole 99% and 1% argument in a different light.
To the victor go the spoils. May the best company win and live large.
Until Then,
Go Big or Go Home!
As another wise person once said “anything worth doing is worth obsessing over.” If you’re going to do it, give yourself to it and give nothing less than everything. That’s why the Valley is the one place on earth where you are respected for failing as long as you try again — it is already assumed you gave it everything and someone else was a microsecond better/faster/stronger. Each time, every time, strive to make that be you until it is. If you don’t want that, do something else. Great post.
Two points:
1) Every large organization needs reliable drones to do the boring grunt work that is a waste of time for “overly intense, passionate or crazy” brilliant people.
2) Exceptional people are not good at beings cogs in large machines. They are, in general, inclined towards entrepreneurship. Therefore, big companies will never be able to attract and retain a staff of entirely “elite” workers, regardless of the industry.
Its not only with large corporations. that was an excerpt from the discussion. in fact there are several elite persons working at several large corporations. they carry the rest.