Molding crappy clay
There are not many problems more serious in the workplace (and life) than a person who lacks true awareness of their own incompetency at a skill. This can impact everything in a business. Communication. Collaboration. Morale. Revenue. Customer retention. Talent retention. This list goes on and on.
If there is something an adult is not good at it, most people know it. They been told so, received bad grades, or maybe gotten fired. Next, hopefully they find something they are at least better at doing, if not awesome.
Maybe it starts in school when every kid is a “rocket scientist”. I have talked with a number of teacher friends who tell tales of parents losing their minds when their kid gets a B or heaven forbid a C grade. Most of the time it’s probably a matter of discipline and effort. Other times it may just be that kid sucks at something and is never going to be good at it.
How much better would it be to help/guide that child (or adult) to find something they are actually good at (and will probably enjoy)? Otherwise they are sentenced to live the life of a square peg crammed into a round hole. Talk about an awful way to live. Stupid, unaware and unhappy.
When I was in the Navy one of my chiefs shared a saying when we were discussing a problem sailor in my section. “You can’t mold shitty clay, Eaves.”
Have you ever worked with someone that just doesn’t get “it”? There was another sailor I knew who was a nice guy (and not in my section). But everything he touched went to crap. Work tasks? Crap. Making coffee? Crap. How he wore his uniform? That’s right. More crap.
Not only do some people don’t know they aren’t good at a skill, they believe they are great at it. In the video below, John Cleese speaks of these people. He describes a theory called the Dunning–Kruger effect.
I see this in the workplace a lot when it comes to leadership and communication. For example, when someone thinks they are great at doing presentations but they should only be used a weapon to bore an enemy to death. Or to confuse them into a zombie-like condition no longer able to comprehend reality.
These people can become a big problem in the workplace. If you have a co-worker with this brand of stupidity who’s allowed to keep a job, get out of there ASAP. This probably means this type of stupidity lurks in leadership.
It’s an even bigger problem when such a person is in a higher up position. If you lead a person like this, you’re sending the message that mediocrity is cool and accepted in your organization. Of course, you could be this type of stupid person and not realize it.
In either stupid employee or leader scenarios, the best option is probably to get rid of that person. Keep in mind we’re talking about someone who is quite confident they are good at something they completely suck at. At some point they have to learn of their deficiency. And stop making other people’s lives more difficult than necessary.
There will be people out there saying this unaware person just needs training or coaching. If you insist on trying to train the problem away, go ahead. Give it a shot. Maybe that’ll be the one in a million shot where the person gets their act together. I am happy to be wrong in that case.
While this type of person seems to be a fairly rare in society, I fear they are becoming more common.
Should this type of person be a company’s responsibility? Just keep in mind how it impacts your organization and workforce. Is trying to fix this problem person a good use of money and resources while risking frustrated talent and/or customers walking out the door?
There is other clay to work with in the world.