Managing talented people
Misfits of science Talented people are outstanding at what they do best... and often dysfunctional in one way or another. This post is about how to manage talented people. And especially about managing them within organizations that need a lot of collaboration (e.g. software development). I'll start with a quote from a TV show from the eighties: "Everybody that is worth the trouble is a little weird" (To be found in episode three of the Misfits of Science ) I have worked with many talented people that were "pretty normal", yet I would need to argue that the majority of the "good people", those that are worth the trouble to "keep", from a management perspective, are also "focused in their own way". And even the talented people that did not show outward signs of "idiosyncratic" behavior, had their special side, which within work organization often showed up as social issues in abrupt or surprisin...