The Myth of the Overqualified Worker

A: Great article

B: what does his have to do with Google? That they hire people like Peter Norvig once in awhile?

edit: Maybe Google is mentioned on the second page? The OP is from 2010 and so the rest of the content (if any, hard to tell with how it ends) is behind a paywall. But what's shown is still a good read.

However, this was written in 2010. What research has been done since then? I imagine that the situation has not changed much since 2010, and may have become worse in terms of the bias. Would love to see more up-to-date or more comprehensive research and findings on this topic.

---

This fear of over-qualification speaks a sad truth about the nature of institutions. When asked to think about it, I think most reasonable people would agree with the statement "You should hire the best qualified person and the company should adapt to that person's initiative and ideas"

But that's not how things work. At a very selfish level, people don't want to be shown up. It would take a very altruistic middle manager to hire someone who could push the ship in the right direction, if that pushing threatened the manager's job (as many reorganizations tend to do). Really, the only person who can hire the best without feeling threatened is the CEO, but in bigger companies, they usually aren't involved. And it's the CEO who would have unilateral power to let the overachievers grow, rather than be stifled by the constraints of their department.

FWIW, the original article has nothing to say at all about Google. The data are interesting, but it is not at all framed the way the HN title suggests.

(Should the title get edited, it was originally: 'Quit putting down Google: "The myth of the overqualified worker"'.)

While it may indeed be possible to ensure positive morale for "over-qualified" individuals through "empowerment" as they say, that very empowerment isn't always realistic, available, or possible. Sometimes it is for a small minority which leads to an ultra-competitive culture among many "over-qualified" folks.

In any event the negative morale that can ensue when many over-qualified people do mundane work is quite detrimental, draining, and contagious. I've experienced it and am happy to now work in a place with a different kind of culture.

It makes sense that HBR which espouses a business school point of view would argue this, because the system works for orgs that use it, at the expense of the drained individuals that burn out. Since there is such an over-supply of talent, it's an employers' market and an outlook like this one can be espoused. We do need to remember that it's not pretty for the folks involved.

The problem of how to employ these folks in empowering jobs, when there are so many of them: not something easily solved.

This isn't really related to the "Google myth" though, is it? I always thought the Google problem was the employees are worried about being replaced, and even the proverbial janitor holds a CS degree and runs an open source project in your subject area on the side.