>Nope, disagree here. I am fully confident that I can hire a great rocket scientist, especially with the resources of a major corporation. And I'm most certainly not a rocket scientist.
How would you hire a rocket scientist?
I mean, I'd go ask a friend who is one, but that's... largely blind luck. I mean, I know the guy is smarter than I am; I can tell he knows more physics than I do. but that's not saying a whole hell of a lot. And even if my friend is a good rocket scientist, I then have to trust he's good at picking other good rocket scientists.
It's a similar problem to how I'd hire an accountant. I mean, super important job, right? keeps me outta jail. Me? I found someone that ran a public q/a site. I knew she was good at explaining things, and I know she had certain certifications... but really, I had no idea (and still have no idea) if she's really doing the acccouning correctly. I mean, I have refered her to a few friends, who all have said positive things about her, so it sounds like I made a good choice, but I don't really know. I can't, at least until I get audited.
I mean, picking good people is a skill; sharing a knowledge base with the role you are picking is not sufficent to pick someone good. I have a very good friend that is a much better programmer than I am. But, her initial impressions, like most people's, mostly focus on confidence. She was interviewing for her boss, and was very excited about one prospect. "I think he's better than I am" she gushed. But, being a rational person, she gave some take-home work. The next day I got a call. "Would a person fail a take-home test on purpose?" Turns out, the guy was just a big talker. But still; the take home test saved her from an embarrassing co-worker. If she didn't have the knowledge to make and judge that test? she would have ended up hiring the idiot.
Without getting bogged down with literals, I'd do my best to determine what constitutes a good rocket scientist, and work away. I suppose I'm just confident I could do it. I've had to hire good people in my field (pharmacy), but I have no formal connection to the industry. Sure, maybe if I was a rocket scientist, I'd have a slight edge in this specific case. But don't forget, being a CEO doesn't mean you're hiring all rocket scientists (or in FB's case, engineers). You have to hire people of all types, so you lose any competitive advantage rather quickly.
>CEO doesn't mean you're hiring all rocket scientists (or in FB's case, engineers). You have to hire people of all types, so you lose any competitive advantage rather quickly.
eh, but depending on the company, some roles are more important than others. I mean, in facebook's case, it'd be marketing. Facebook, really, doesn't need top of the world Engineers; paying 5x what they would otherwise on infrastructure won't kill them. (they do need good people for the places where Engineering and Marketing colide. They need people that are good at psychology and at least mediocre programmers.) But marketing is what they /do/ - their business plan and their P/E is predicated on capturing a huge percentage of the world's advertising dollars. without best in the world marketing types, they are sunk.
This is why having even a relitively small edge in hiring the best people in one particular area can make such a huge difference, and one of the major reasons why I think CEO experience is not particularly portable across fields.
How would you hire a rocket scientist?
I mean, I'd go ask a friend who is one, but that's... largely blind luck. I mean, I know the guy is smarter than I am; I can tell he knows more physics than I do. but that's not saying a whole hell of a lot. And even if my friend is a good rocket scientist, I then have to trust he's good at picking other good rocket scientists.
It's a similar problem to how I'd hire an accountant. I mean, super important job, right? keeps me outta jail. Me? I found someone that ran a public q/a site. I knew she was good at explaining things, and I know she had certain certifications... but really, I had no idea (and still have no idea) if she's really doing the acccouning correctly. I mean, I have refered her to a few friends, who all have said positive things about her, so it sounds like I made a good choice, but I don't really know. I can't, at least until I get audited.
I mean, picking good people is a skill; sharing a knowledge base with the role you are picking is not sufficent to pick someone good. I have a very good friend that is a much better programmer than I am. But, her initial impressions, like most people's, mostly focus on confidence. She was interviewing for her boss, and was very excited about one prospect. "I think he's better than I am" she gushed. But, being a rational person, she gave some take-home work. The next day I got a call. "Would a person fail a take-home test on purpose?" Turns out, the guy was just a big talker. But still; the take home test saved her from an embarrassing co-worker. If she didn't have the knowledge to make and judge that test? she would have ended up hiring the idiot.