Chris had only worked for me for a few weeks when I asked him to join a roundtable meeting with several outside consultants. He sat through the two-hour presentation stony-faced and silent until asked by the lead consultant if he had any comments. Then he nodded impatiently.
“This has been totally bush league,” he said. “I can’t believe that we actually pay you for doing this.”
This story originally ran in issue 13 of RELEVANT
He went on to point out many serious flaws in the consultants’ research, but he wasn’t watching carefully enough to see the color drain right out of their faces. By the time they’d slunk out the room, Chris had embarrassed me and everyone else present. He didn’t quite figure this out until the next month’s meeting, to which he pointedly wasn’t invited.
Had Chris been smarter and nicer, he would have made his excellent points and been a hero for it. Poor Chris. He was armed to the teeth, well-educated and wired for decision speed. But he was completely misdirected about how to use his many talents because...
08.05.08
