The Secret To Finding Great Talent - Tyler Cowen
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- čas přidán 15. 06. 2024
- Tyler Cowen is the Holbert L. Harris Chair of Economics at George Mason University, a columnist, podcaster, blogger and an author.
Finding and recruiting the best talent is perhaps the most important job that an organisation has. Skilful, enthusiastic, keen staff can make or break a business, so why is it that most companies are mostly useless when it comes to discovering talent?
Expect to learn whether population collapse is coming very soon, whether talent is innate or developed, why there is a crisis of talent when we have more people on earth than ever before, whether you should look at someone's parents before hiring them, the best questions to ask in an interview, what SpaceX's hiring strategy teaches us about thoroughness, how Tyler screens young staff for the most original thinkers and much more...
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00:00 Intro
00:26 Is Population Collapse a Problem?
04:26 Why the Recruitment Process is Wrong
08:32 Defining and Finding Talent
15:13 Measuring Ambition
23:37 Is Talent Genetic?
27:39 Improving the Education System
31:55 Influence of Parents & Attributes
38:49 Thinking Like an Athlete
47:08 How to Source Talent
57:22 When Are Charisma & Confidence Important?
1:01:31 Where to Find Tyler
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Hello you beauties. Here’s the timestamps:
00:00 Intro
00:26 Is Population Collapse a Problem?
04:26 Why the Recruitment Process is Wrong
08:32 Defining and Finding Talent
15:13 Measuring Ambition
23:37 Is Talent Genetic?
27:39 Improving the Education System
31:55 Influence of Parents & Attributes
38:49 Thinking Like an Athlete
47:08 How to Source Talent
57:22 When Are Charisma & Confidence Important?
1:01:31 Where to Find Tyler
Chris, my man - what popular CTs DON'T you believe in.? I'd love to drop you some links, that might change your mind. And I'm very much into "proof not claims", so I won't waste your time. For the record, I've barely looked at flat earth - we all know it is - here and there, not all the way around.. :D
well that whole thing was very insightful but also makes me want to off myself
"Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see."
- Arthur Schopenhauer.
ignorance asks what's a target?
stupidity asks how do i eat a target?
While higher education hasn't changed much in the US, it's refreshing to see people like Joel Haver, Michael Reeves, Ethan Chlebowski, Joe Rogan, and so many other great youtubers, who show that a degree doesn't make you a filmmaker, an engineer, a chef, etc. These are people that the industry would never hire, yet their integrity produces far more value than any institution, in my opinion.
Companies hire one's SKILLS but fire them on the basis of their TRAITS.
Skills can always get better, sharpened, and improved, however human connection, manners, and social interactions are so much harder.
So many questions fired at Tyler because he gets through so many of them with short and concise answers. Love this interview. Thanks.
He never rambles, very target oriented conversationist.
Tyler Cowan is such a genius. Excellent interview.
Agreed.
Tyler has an intimidating quick-witted wide-ranging intellect,
that can be a little abrupt, or even prickly,
but I thought Chris did a great job.
i found it largely just what i've thought forever just put into words by a confident authority figure.
21:24 "Verkrampft" 😄 It means tense or strained in German. Germans are hard-working people but unfortunately their bureaucracy is excessive and suffocating and that's one major reason they won't have a start-up culture maybe with the exception of Berlin. Additionally Germany belongs to the countries in Europe that have the highest tax rates (mainly VAT, income tax, social security tax/social insurance contribution and corporate tax) and to make matters worse it has the highest energy prices.
Companies don’t need talent. They need obedient workers who will do what they’re told. The last thing the CEO wants is a free thinking employee. Of course they can’t say this, so they’ll pander to their employees with b.s like “we are a family”
Its not bs though. People wanna participate in something larger than themselves, and it sometimes does feel like a family. The problem is money
Then they get surprised when their lunch gets eaten by a group of 5 people.
The reason the UK and France have returned to replacement levels of birth rates is not because of British or French people. Its because the immigrant population has a much higher birth rate. Naturally this leads to a massive change in cultural dynamics which we will all see pan out. I fear these countries are already culturally lost to the anulls of time for this reason alone.
That’s a very interesting theory
@@ChrisWillx it is, and when this is projected forward given the current immigrant population is well over 15% is eye opening to say the least. Also bear in mind to win a seat in Parliament you need typically 35% of constituent votes...and that's of those who actually vote...of course people will vote for people who qre culturally like them. Honestly I don't think this can be resolved :/
France is heading for civil war.
@@Mac-ku3xu not convinced. Most of France are insulated from what is going on and what will happen as no-one talks about and it is actively suppressed. France will change beyond recovery slowly over time. The one day people will realise its too late. The world will then have nations of different people. But France won't be one - it itself will be a nation of different people's.
This is so obviously true it’s a truism at this point. I’m puzzled Cowen doesn’t know this.
Great episode Chris ...keep it up!
thank you!! very good podcast!
Brilliant interview
Tyler Cowen ? Yes!!!!!!
The analysis on Peter Thiel is spot on.
12:30 This is awesome. This is literally what I've done and I'm not that smart. I just ask people what they do for fun and what they like and go from there. A person that adds value will add value to this conversation. Creative people will create and they can't be stopped. If a person does not like or do anything or can't talk about they things they like then they are just bodies to fill a space. If they don't get lost in their own heads between ideas and possibilities then they can work someplace else.
I may also throw in very simple real world problem that they will face and see what they say. Some go on and acting like they know how to solve the problem but mostly I'm waiting for them to say "I ask" or "I talk" or "I google".
What is his new book called? Thanks.
Edit: It's called Talent. I wish it was plugged more. Great podcast!
i like the randomization idea so much
for college admissions
"What are the open tabs on your browser right now?" What a great question!
Listened for 4 secs and like.. thought of those comments for years
I worked my ass of the last 6 months to get 5 star reviews at my consulting agency to have HR tell me my asking price for salary is outside my levels bracket. Literally asked for the normal day rate for someone in my field and both managers apparently disagree but cant go against it.
Seems like a great way to lose talent. Also I have no problem at all with women but the amount of micro managing females Ive had to work with alongside others who I believe are legitimately better equipped for the role is plain annoying.
No longer will merit and hard work alone get you ahead in this clown woke world.
Please expand on "micro managing".
Micro managing you, or what?
Academic talent/gifts are usually discovered in early/mid elementary school aptitude testing-- especially if the test results are statistically shown to be much higher than average, compared to their peers, in certain subjects (i.e.; fine arts, mathematical abilities, etc.). Certain states have brought back the 'gifted & talented program' for this reason-- to discover objective talent.
Yes indeed, but those programs mean nothing in the real adult world. Since I was 8 they put me in gifted programs, but employers couldn't care less if I have a high IQ or creative mind. They just want a slick resume that reflects the precise experience/skill set they require. Fortunately I have my own creative endeavors but these days even Picasso himself would have to work a "day job" to survive.
@@AGirlofYesterday Yes, still true today that pursuing fine arts is usually discouraged. Well, depends on what abilities you can offer. Digital art? Tech skills can be learned. Just out of curiosity, what were you labeled 'gifted' in, specifically?
@@elisabeth4342 They just tested IQs and mine fell into the top 1% of the city, creatively gifted in visual art & language. I have written books and had my paintings in galleries, but the success has been small-scale and limited by lack of funds. I just don't or can't (not won't) think like a business entrepreneur or corporate climber. Artists rarely do. I'm certainly not the only one falling through the cracks in a purely profit-driven society.
In Denmark they used to shoot them...
@@AGirlofYesterday Oh man - woman.. ;) That gave me goose bumps.. Soo happy you got your gift to work for you, instead of against you.. If you don't want to stay secret, what do you do.? Danish huy in Denmark asking.
Chris this couldn't have come at a better time man! Just had a great business idea today and my first limitting belief was: how do I hire loyal & responsible talent? Thanks for making this episode!
I cannot find the data showing that the UK and France are above replacement rate. Both are below 2.1, even below 1.9.
preach
IQ is highly correlated to job performance. He said IQ is not really correlated to income (not true there is) but job performance is not exactly the same thing as income. All things being equal, IQ is the strongest predictor. Effective for low complexity jobs like Starbucks cashier, but extremely effective predictor for high complexity jobs like astrophysicists.
Trying to learn all these optimizations that navy seal, athletes, musicians do with animation/art lol.
Also, god I wish I knew more people irl who can talk about ideas with me. I met a lot of online Artist/Animators who do so since art is synomous with ideas which is AMAZING but geez irl, it's still mostly discussion about things, events or people. And when I bring up ideas (not just art ideas, but overall) no one cares or just says it won't work or just criticize it without any deep thought, usually just shallow criticism. I don't care about if I'm a "smart person for liking talk about ideas." Just feel lonely and misunderstood irl due to it. It does seem only a minority talk about ideas. I don't think this is bad, I sort of don't agree with the quote, but the rarity of idea-discussing individuals is high. It's likely correlated with Openness to Experience's facet Intellect so... I that sort of explains why to a degree(?).
Definitely going to dedication my life to become Promethean. Rebellious extremely innovative individual. Bet.
Reading through your comment, I was about to say: very few people are high in openness to experience.
I noticed the same thing at my workplace, I do a PhD Physics.
I would engage in some philosophical or other question, and a very select group of people was willing to even engage in that. Let alone start such a conversation.
And you would think, an academic environment with physicists: so many intelligent people, that solve difficult problems. But no, intelligence and problem solving ability are not the same as openness. Openness among physicists, is not selected for. You need to write many papers that nobody cares about, rather than one paper that could change the world.
Please ask him, ,"What head set are you using?" That looks comfy and sounds good.
Chris saying he learned more in 6 months starting his business than in multiple years of higher education stretches credulity. Maybe more about practical aspects and the potential of the podcast business but I doubt he'd have the intellectual background, just sheer breadth of ideas, to engage guests like Tyler without the vicarious experience that comes through structured learning and experience that you get through formal higher ed.
To be fair, we also have trees in our country older then your country.
I wish education moved move towards a certificate model, you can start and stop at any time, the only thing that matters is how many certs you have. Get rid of the rigid title system and only demand scientific works if you want to stay in academia.
At least in computer science this would make a lot more sense. It's moving in this direction, but it isn't accepted everywhere yet.
Or a veeery difficult exam, that you can try to pass, no matter how little formel education you might have.
Chris, great interview. Seems like you are dancing around questions about 'objective reality', as in the Navy SEAL assessment of talent, or in your words, the lack of variance in 300kg as being objectively true. These are interesting subjects to me as well the higher altitude view of what a human objectively is/does or can do. In that regard, there seems to be a hierarchical selection bias (or tendencies) by those such as Tim Kennedy (who I adore). Would be very interesting to get your analysis on hierarchy selection (priority and process type) from this objective view, perhaps elucidating more about correlations between objective reality and bias...
Thanks for letting me share some word salad! Love y'all!
Jordan B. Peterson has powerful wisdom that is both priceless and timeless.
Interesting you've assess the UK as less creative - if I'm not mistaken, the UK has the highest or one of the highest concentrations of authors AND of musicians of any country in the world! Not to mention being the birthplace of a vastly disproportionate number of the modern world's most significant inventions - personally I think what your observing is a lack of confidence
The birth rate in England did not increase to replacement rate.Don't know where he pulled that stat...
House Prices and free time are the reasons people stop having kids. When everyone goes to the capitol and can't afford a big enough house, and works all the hours, they don't have kids.
Then don't move to the capitol.
what about everyone not in the capitol? can't just be because of that
So many factors... I think it can go any which way.. for example,
if we're living at a time when the most number of humans exist, then it would seem there will be a vast surplus of housing in the future.
With continued automation and the removal of BS jobs, what happens when a society doesn't need everyone to be fully employed? What will people do with the time?
Not long ago, a single wage-earner was enough to raise a family of 4... perhaps multi-family living will be the norm 50 years from now.
“England - if you can consider that a country” 😆
Tooth whiteness attribute maximized.
Effect:
Charisma +5, Confidence +1, Uncanny Valley +2
58:20 Whoo! Cincinnati Reference!
Regarding the 52m mark.. I get how the extreme pessimist would cash out when things are down, but why would the extreme optimist also cash out at that time?
CZcams will automatically link into the video if you write timecodes like this 52:00
I DON'T believe that "population collapse", should be a problem. The problem - as I expect things to go - will be about, how the population is "created"..
25:25 I think I've seen graphs correlating i.q. to income in the past so for this guy to say we don't have any evidence correlating a relationship either he has access to some alternative data sets or he's just making things up to suit his fancys.
That thumbnail words r truth. js
It might be Tyler's setup but does anyone else hear a slight echo when Chris talks?
Chris, mate. It’s small and petty, I know. But while you’re over there, could you correct your US guests on the distinction between England and the UK. They need to know. It’s been a while
Thought Chris Williamson was Chris Martin🤷.
This is my first note in your podcast.
So i will start with that i realy enjoy it. Yiu questions are very well prepare.
Regarding your guest, I think he is a bit wrong.
Fertility rate of uk in 21 is 1.61...much much below 2.1(replacment point).
Creativity belongs to the youngs. When germany average age is 47 you will not have a creatve country(this is additional reason why fertility rate is important)
Take peapole from poor non advance country it take at least one generation to take their native ,non western , cultur away. This is why fertility rate are important.
If all you team will be creative , for example 10 out 10, you will never had any job done. You are under appriciate the good hard confomative workers. You need 1 maybe 2 creative out of 10.
I have to give hin that thebidea of ending book diffrently is a nice Q.
In the enjoy it 🙂
The opening statements about population collapse were incredibly misleading. The only country that’s ever moved back above replacement is Israel - population collapse is a much, much bigger issue than his hand waving made it seem
The presumption that everyone uses the same criteria for hiring or searching for/recruiting talent - i.e. the best and brightest - is nice in theory, but in today's world merit has given way to the equity and diversity criteria, which has little to do with the best and brightest and everything to do with checking largely irrelevant boxes. HR Departments are the primary driver of this effort, and those staffing those departments are either middling talents or outright activists, but either way still get their marching orders from above. The saving grace in many fields is simply the reality that no matter how hard you try, you still end up with the talent and skills you are looking for because it cannot be met within the desired equity and diversity criteria.
HR does not do hiring or interviewing to choose the best. They process the paperwork once the hiring managers have made their pick. This man probably never worked a day in corporate world. Now ask me why hiring managers stick to bad methods of hiring
He has too narrow a view of talent. If you've dealt with a few HR people their productivity spread is huge. If you watched enough people doing simple production work like putting doughnuts in a box, their productivity spread is also huge. The pressures put upon them usually means that manifests itself as some people working hard all day, while the talented have an easy time. You could, if course, motivate the talented to produce way above their quota.
cant really motivate high producers, you can however, destroy that motivation easily. See above.
"Never hire toxic people".
No, no, no to randomization. Instead look for creativity in the application and care less about grades, more about test score floors.
Portugal stopped their favorable crypto policies
There's something dark and disturbing here... haven't figured out what it is yet.
Definitely work on Pronunciation and loosing the slangs that came with the accent (I can speak on this, I’m a foreigner and I did it)
I find his first statement irritating. England and France's birthrates are up. Yes ... "especially if nation-states truly start to shrink, become vulnerable to foreign exploitation and capture ... that we will find ways to get population numbers back up again." Well, what do you think is causing England and France's numbers to come up?
Fuck HR culture! And HR in general. It serves as no protection for employees and only seeks to safeguard corporate interests, and does so in a net negative fashion as it dehumanises and fragments people, nullufying them from the very enthusiastic pursuits that innovation requires.
Point in case; A genuis level animator and coder I know is tenacious to the nth degree, once his mind is on a problem it won't rest. He'll dive into the work regardless of the hour. He turned up at the studio (one owned by a global corp) on one of his days off, and at some point during the day a woman from HR tries to force him to go home stating "you shouldn't be in work today"... Now burnout for this guy doesn't phase him, his off switch is once he knows that he made the progress that sparked his mind into fastidious action.
HR is the equivalent of a Mother who tells their children not to climb trees because they'll fall. Yeah sure they might, but they also might see a fantastic view of things if they reach the top.
The insanity today is that as far as a corporation is concerned you are:
1) A human resource
2) An employee
3) A potential liability
4) A potential asset
5) A potential claimant
6) A public relation
And this form of fragmentation of the human is dehumanising. When you consider that the inward view is that a person is a human resource, yet outwardly a public relation, that's just insane. So the moment you step through a company door, you're no longer wearing the public person badge, and barely the human badge, you're a resource.
And let's not go down the road of assessing corporate cultures impact on birth rates or population sizes.
We've placed innovation on a pedastle, and allowed techno-cratic corporatism to become the defacto dominant mode of society. The luddites might have had a significant point to make afterall.
HR culture is just another scam to ensure that administrators have a form of employment. And in today's world the administrators run the shop. They create more and more rules regarding how things "should" and "ought" to run, and in the meantime creativity and ingenuity becomes stifled... Just ask Hollywood with it's remakes of old ideas, and sparse lack of anything remotely fresh or interesting.
all that is good, however as someone who hires people and understands how challenging is to find right fit and skill set, I have implemented cognitive tests as first step. I’m all about empowering you to achieve your potential and passion, but first show me you are not a parrot
For the most part HR is sub-par as a component of an organisation, I don't think HR has a great utility at all !
I have been one a ton of interviews in my lifetime, and I can tell you that HR recruiters are the worst interviewers! They almost never put forward any effort to create rapport. Part of conversation is to mirror your conversation partner and thus, the candidate ends up just as uninterested and unmotivated to engage as the HR interviewer. Not sure why this is, but HR seems to be full of humanless robots.
Homework discriminates against lazy people. Rebellious ones are more likely troublemakers than innovators.
Probably true, but it is also a notorious fact that some highly creative people neglect mundane tasks to concentrate on ambitious projects that fascinate them.
@@73elephants I understand, but, you can play in both worlds: give them the work they want while creating your own innovation.
Your heuristic commits the proportion fallacy. If 92% of those who don’t hand in homework are lazy and 8% are chaotic-productive, but that 8% contains EVERY chaotic-productive person, you’ve lumped in all chaotic-productive people with the lazy ones.
@@realistic_delinquent Read my reply to Seventy-Three Elephants. I don't lump everyone together. Outstanding minds can innovate while still doing their homework.
@@fearthehoneybadger Yes, you are not lumping them together, but one of the points raised by Tyler Cowen is that optimization of homework (or adjacent activities) leaves a lot of productive talent on the table, and a lot of homework out there isn't ideal, making it overfitted for someone who does mundane tasks, which, when it comes to talent, is not a good predictor for.
I wouldn't really pay much attention to the birth rates at the moment, with couples getting children later the tempo effect skews the numbers, the economy is at the worst place in decades, wages are half of what productivity gains would suggest, the economy is overregulated, the housing market artificially inflated, inflation is destroying savings and wages, innovation has been somewhat stagnant.
The same is true in any developed country today, thanks to "modern" economics.
If these problems are ever resolved, I'm sure birthrates will rise again. And these things have a tendency to work themselves out on historic timescales. This isn't the first time this has happened. From the historic cycles things should be improving drastically from 2025 (± 3) onwards. You can already see technological development exploding, so I think it'll be alright.
And advances in medicine/technology will help us live healthy longer. And besides, soon we'll have artificial generalized intelligence, if it doesn't kill us all, it'll bring unimaginable prosperity.
It is the first time in history we have replacement level immigration. Birthrates of 1.2 is a sign of a dying people. If it was some exitoc species not getting enough offspring you would surely agreed that something was wrong?
You were probably the smartest in your class, if it wasn't some brainac school class.. Nice to see a thought through comment.!
Or you get sackes by a narcissist!!!!!
The claim about randomization at University is totally ridiculous. This is how we get a backward system like those in east Asia.
The ability to select people for things that don't appear in test scores is precisely what COULD allow schools to pick creatives types over those who are clever conformists.
In east asia you have to be an extreme conformist and work extremely hard to get into the top universities. It is a creativity killer, for sure.
Genius (which I guess is talent materialized) is Ability x Grit x Creativity according to A Jensen.
Randomization of applicants might pick more creative people, but I doubt it.
I think his argument could be that the effect of ability and grit has diminishing returns, and I think that is correct (when you are in the extreme area of the curve).
Educational success does not select much for creativity, so in theory you could sacrifice some ability (or IQ) and grit for creativity and get a better result.