[NateEag]

This is an appealing narrative without evidence.

How does the author know Marias make up the majority of most companies? Where's the data supporting that claim?

It may be true - it sounds plausible to those of us who've been a Maria in the salt mines of a dysfunctional company.

It appeals to us to think we're the hidden gems the company needs to invest in.

Something being appealing doesn't make it true, though, even if you can tell a just-so story about it.

[mlhpdx]

> This is an appealing narrative without evidence.

I had the same thought, but I’m grateful to the author for putting their opinions out for us to see.

It is an interesting quandary - getting “more” from someone, pragmatic or otherwise, raises questions. Is the premise that they aren’t providing value on a level with salary? Or, is it that the business has a right/obligation to extract more? The latter is offensive, fundamentally because “value” may be arbitrarily (perhaps capriciously) determined.

On the other hand, I find the folks suggesting that doing an hours work a day is fine. It’s not. That’s equally offensive.

[OkayPhysicist]

Labor relations are intrinsically adversarial. The employer wants to pay as little as they can get away with for as much work as possible, the employee wants to be paid as much as possible for as little work as they can get away with.

This article is written for the employer's side, trying to optimize their game. The employees trying to normalize working approximately nothing are optimizing their side.

It's not offensive, it's just economics.

[bb88]

Many employees are trying to minimize their work. (Do we really need to fill out 10 TPS reports that no one reads?) Often the ones who are doing the most menial tasks would definitely want to do something else more meaningful

Not everyone wants to work less. Many want a path to make an impact to the organization, but don't see how. They'd rather just be quiet engineers/accountants/office workers/etc.

[mlhpdx]

As an employer/owner/investor I’m not trying to minimize expenses I’m trying to maximize growth/value. Abusing people is not a path to success by that metric.

[fuzzfactor]

One disconnect is that most employers are not personally the owners, and most owners do not actually own as much as the investors.

No surprise they do it the other way around when they don't have the collective talent to maximize value and have it result in growth.

[therealdrag0]

I don’t know how to out this “correctly”. But some of these developer complains remind me of the whole “incel” situation, where people rather complain about how the world works instead of improving themselves or learning how to excel in it.

Sure some people are conflict adverse, but some conflict aversion is healthy (there shouldn’t be physical or verbal fights at work) while some is being introverted or on the spectrum or lazy to a degree that the rest of the world shouldn’t be expected to bend to.

The way the author puts it I’m not even sure what the untapped potential even is. They describe these 75% as “doing what they can”. Okay so they’re just worker bees. That’s fine. What’s the problem?

[lucianbr]

There's some useful insight here even if the percents are wrong. Whatever the numbers, even if 10% are Marias, they're still an untapped resource, if not "the biggest". And the fact that some of us have been this person proves the percentage is not zero.

Feels like you found a small inaccuracy in the text, and jumped up "Aha! Everything you said is wrong!". Also an appealing narrative.

[ryandrake]

Yea, everyone is nit-picking the numbers... Where's the evidence? Where's the citations? Not everything is a paper in an academic publication. The quadrants themselves hold up and anecdotally match my experiences over decades of work. I can easily remember people I've worked with in each quadrant, and yes, the lower-right (whatever percent they are) are totally underutilized and mostly invisible.

[bb88]

Hacker News never is, and never was a place for academic arguments.

[NateEag]

> There's some useful insight here even if the percents are wrong. Whatever the numbers, even if 10% are Marias, they're still an untapped resource, if not "the biggest". And the fact that some of us have been this person proves the percentage is not zero.

All very fair and good points.

The author does make a strong claim, though, and I'm asking if there's evidence to back it up.

I probably wouldn't if they'd written "Some people are underused by their companies because they're Marias," which is a much smaller claim but still a perfectly fine basis for moving on to a discussion of how to get more value from those employees.

> Feels like you found a small inaccuracy in the text, and jumped up "Aha! Everything you said is wrong!". Also an appealing narrative.

Would you show me where you see this? I reread what I wrote and I'm not finding that, but maybe I'm just missing it.

[fortani]

I left a comment elsewhere on this thread, but here's an interesting quote by General Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord, an anti-Nazi WWII general.

"I distinguish four types. There are clever, hardworking, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and hardworking; their place is the General Staff. The next ones are stupid and lazy; they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the mental clarity and strength of nerve necessary for difficult decisions. One must beware of anyone who is both stupid and hardworking; he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always only cause damage."

So according to him, most people seem to fall into the bucket of being lazy and stupid, which is closer to reality. "Skilled pragmatists" seem to map into what he terms "clever and lazy".