Column
Should you hire natural geniuses or hard workers?
Diana Varma
The answer can be complex and contradictory
You have two candidates whom you recently interviewed
and they are eagerly awaiting your response. Both are quali-
fied to do the job and both have personalities that fit well
with your company’s culture. Both went to good schools and
got good grades. However, it became clear in the interview
that one candidate was naturally gifted and has never had
to work hard for their rewards, while the other has consist-
ently worked hard to get where they are today.
So as a manager, is it favourable to hire the most naturally
gifted “genius”? Or does it make more sense to hire the less
naturally talented candidate who is capable of doing the job
and consistently works hard to get the job done?
Like most important questions, this answer is a shade of
grey rather than black or white. Most experts can agree that
having the competency, skills, and experience to perform
the job are fundamental requirements to fill any role. Further-
more, attitude, passion, personality, and the ability to work
well with others (also called “fit”) are other critical compon-
ents in making hiring decisions.
However, author Angela Duckworth convincingly argues
that one trait has proven time and time again to be a consist-
ent predictor of success: grit. From her book Grit: The Power
of Passion and Perseverance, she describes a number of
scientific studies, as well as her own experiences, that con-
sistently reinforce the idea that talent can only take a person
so far. After leaving a demanding role in management con-
sulting in her late twenties for an even more demanding role
teaching grade-seven math, she discovered that IQ was not
the only difference that separated her best and worst stu-
dents. She argues that success in grade-seven math, much
like success in life, requires more than just the ability to learn
quickly and easily. It requires the ability to work on some-
thing you’re deeply interested in (passion) and work hard to
reach a long-term goal (perseverance).
Showing up counts for a lot
I’ve written about grit before and I’ll inevitably write about
it again because it’s such an important concept in our time
of “insta-this” and “insta-that”. Grit requires showing up over
and over and over again. It requires demonstrating resilience
in the face of difficulty and resisting the urge to take the
easy way out. It requires persevering when what you’re
working on isn’t fun any more in order to achieve the goal
you’ve set out to accomplish. It requires “deliberate practice”,
picking yourself up after failure, and plain old hard work.
Even Darwin shared a similar opinion on work ethic versus
natural talent: “...for I have always maintained that, excepting
fools, men did not differ much in intellect, only in zeal and
28 | February 2018 | GRAPHIC ARTS MAGAZINE
hard work; and I still think this is an eminently important
difference.”
In her book, Duckworth explains that in national US surveys,
Americans have been asked “Which is more important to
success - talent or effort?” Americans choose “effort” twice
as often. They’ve also been asked, “If you were hiring a new
employee, which of the following qualities would you think is
most important?” “Hardworking” is chosen five times as often
as “intelligence”. It seems as though most people understand
the importance and impact of hard work.
Duckworth also explains an interesting contradiction. In a
study conducted by psychologist Chia-Jung Tsay, she uncov-
ered that as much as people believe that hard work is
important, people love natural talent. Her studies found that
participants outwardly stated one thing (that hard work is
important) but thought another, by directly contradicting their
own beliefs and stating that the study’s subjects who had
natural talent were more likely to succeed and were “more
hirable” than their counterparts. In other words, talent dis-
tracts us. This can be a problem because in her research,
Duckworth has found that grit is usually unrelated (and some-
times inversely related) to measures of talent.
Let’s be clear that if a
candidate has proven
themselves to be both
hardworking and high-
ly intelligent, that
would be like having
your cake and eating
it too. These people
do exist and they do
great things in many
companies, but there
are also many talented
people in this world
who choose not to
work hard at their
craft. Talent is one
thing, but what one does (or doesn’t do) with that talent is
quite another thing.
Author Angela Duckworth
convincingly argues that
one trait has proven time
and time again to be
a consistent predictor
of success: grit
The bottom line is that hard work counts for a lot in the daily
grind of business.
Diana Varma is an Instructor at the School of Graphic
Communications Management at Ryerson University and the
Owner of ON-SITE First Aid & CPR Training Group, a health & safety
company that provides training to the Graphic Arts Industry.
graphicartsmag.com