Being Likeable Matters More than Being Competent

Here are some thoughts from page 90 of Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success (a book I liked very much) where the author says that it's more important to be likeable than to be competent:

It's hard to underestimate the impact of good social skills on your career. In fact, across the board, in a wide variety of businesses, people would rather work with someone who is likeable and incompetent than with someone who is skilled and obnoxious.

She then goes on to talk about how to be likeable and so on.

I have several thoughts on this subject. Here are a few:

1. Yes, it's important to your career that you're likeable. We all spend a lot of time at work and no one wants to spend that time around someone who's obnoxious. This means people will work around those who are not at least somewhat likeable, and thus potentially negatively impact their career.

2. That said, someone who's the greatest guy in the world is going nowhere if he's a total waste when it comes to performance. Yeah, people will like him, but they'll also avoid him like they will the unlikeable guy. Why? Because no one wants to have part of their project (or whatever) controlled by someone who doesn't know what he's doing.

3. All of the above is from the perspective of people working at various companies. Companies themselves want results and don't really care about likeability (unless it interferes with moral, performance of others, etc.) We've all seen the extremely productive jerk get promoted time and time again.

4. I would say that there's a base level of likeability that any employee needs to have, and once they have that, performance is what matters.

5. The base level I talk about in point #4 is pretty low. Most people you'd come in contact with would have at least this level of likeability.

So, what's your take on this issue?

Comments

[Donald Dement]

I haven't read the book (yet), but I'm guessing she may be referencing articles similar to the one in the June 2005 Harvard Business Review, "Competent Jerks, Lovable Fools, and the Formation of Social Networks" by Casciaro and Lobo. Their research indicates that employees will choose a congenial colleague over someone a more capable jerk. They go on to say that if someone is liked, then other employees will likely seek out every little bit of competence; whereas jerks may be highly talented individual performers, but contribute little to the performance of the organization as a whole. So jerks may know a great deal, but getting information from them is more trouble than it's worth!

However, you can't have a party all the time. The authors suggest that managers leverage the likeability by putting the lovable fools in positions that bridge gaps in the company and either coach or reposition the competent jerks so that you maximize their contribution.

I think one related question is: How much of a 'jerk factor' are you willing to accept on your team?