Ingredients of a Career "Hot Streak"

Director Peter Jackson
Source: Indiewire

Under what conditions do people experience a burst of unprecdented success in their careers? Scholars have been studying the ingredients of career "hot streaks" for some time. At first, scholars thought that such unusual periods of success occurred randomly. However, new research methods have capitalized on artificial intelligence to advance our understanding of such hot streaks. Scholars Lu Liu, Nima Dehmamy, Jillian Chown, C. Lee Giles, and Dashun Wang developed an AI system to study the work of 2,128 artists, 4,337 directors, and 20,040 scientists.  They found that hot streaks emerged when these artists, directors, and scientists first engaged in a period of broad exploration of creative options and then shifted to an exploitation phase in which they focused intensely in a particular domain.  Kellogg Insight summarized their findings:

The results make clear the “recipe” for a hot streak: exploration of creative options followed by exploitation of a specific “lane” of work ultimately leading to greater success. This held true across all three domains studied.  For example, director Peter Jackson made films that fell into horror, comedy, drama, and other genres (reflecting a period of exploration) before hitting it much bigger with the Lord of the Rings fantasy franchise. Analysis of painter Jackson Pollock’s work, similarly, showed exploration of a wide range of styles before the focused “drip period” (1946–1950) that elevated him to global fame.

The research found, further, that exploration or exploitation by itself is not enough for a hot streak. That is, only the specific exploration-exploitation sequence led to the highest increase in likelihood of a hot streak: hot streaks following that sequence were 20.5 percent, 13.8 percent, and 19.2 percent more likely for artists, directors, and scientists, respectively, versus after a random point in a given career. Exploration and exploitation alone were associated with no such increase.

“If you just do one or the other, you don’t get the full impact,” Chown says. “It has to be the combination of exploration followed by exploitation: experimenting in different areas, learning different domains and approaches, then really hunkering down and developing that body of high-impact work.”  Wang agrees: “Our work shows that people experiment and likely gain new skills from work in different subfields, and then help find the best one to exploit, which seem crucial for hot streak.”

As I read this study, I was reminded of a terrific book I read several years ago by David Epstein.  In that book, Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World, Epstein argues that we should not specialize early and narrowly in our lives.  Instead, we should explore and develop competence in multiple areas.  He argues that these generalists ultimately create more innovation than people who specalize narrowly.   This AI-driven study of scientists, directors, and artists takes Epstein's argument one step further.  It confirms the value of being a generalist, though it emphasizes the benefits of a shift from broad competence to specific expertise over time.  Either way, both Epstein's book and this study provide a compelling argument for not restricting yourself too early in your career.  Unfortunately, in many professions, the pressure to specialize can be very powerful.  Take my profession, for instance.  In management academia, the path to early career success seems to emphasize mastery of a narrow domain - and too often, that entails a quite esoteric focus.  Broadening the mind has many benefits, and we should not forget that as we coach and mentor young people in their careers.  

Developing People: Focusing on the What AND the How

Source: Pixabay

Adam Bryant recently posted a terrific interview with Matt Schuyler, Chief Administrative Officer at Hilton.  He asked Schuyler about a key leadership lesson learned during his career.    Schuyler offered this anecdote about his time at PWC: 

In a professional services firm like Price Waterhouse, it’s an up-or-out environment. Around year 11 or 12, you know it’s time for consideration for partnership, which is the pinnacle. In the spring of that twelfth year for me, I got a call from my boss who was based in London, and he said, “Can you fly over to London to see me tomorrow?”

I arrived early the next morning, and he said, “Let’s go grab a pint.” And sure enough, the pubs were open at 8:30 in the morning. So we sat down and he said, “I have some news for you. You didn’t make it.” This was devastating because I’d spent the better part of twelve years leading up to this moment, and in the previous year I had accomplished all my objectives.

But then he said, “The good news is that it’s a ‘not now,’ not a ‘no never, ever.’” And here’s the lesson he shared: “We were not measuring you on the ‘what.’ We were measuring you on the ‘how,’ and you got more done than we’ve ever seen anybody get done, so you’ve checked the ‘what’ box. On the ‘how,’ you created some waves along the journey because you were such a zealot in getting a lot done. So you have a do-over. Take this next year, focus on the how, not the what.” The next year I made partner and I try to remember that lesson every day when I come to work.

Two important lessons jump out at me from this story.  First, the partners did not evaluate Schuyler simply based on WHAT he achieved.  They cared about HOW he did it as well.  That's crucial.  Second, the partners didn't give up on Schuyler simply because he had stumbled on the HOW.  They offered him constructive feedback and gave him an opportunity to course correct.  He did and achieved further success at the organization.  Of course, some folks won't be able to internalize that type of feedback and make the necessary changes.  However, many people will be able to do so if they are offered the right feedback, coaching, and development.  

Understanding Your Employees' Aspirations

Source:  Needpix.com

In a recent interview published on the Knowledge@Wharton website, Dartmouth Professor Syd Finkelstein talked about lowering employee anxiety and communicating effectively with your employees during this time of remote work.   He explains what should be happening during one-on-one conversations with your team members. In particular, he describes how leaders should try to understand their employees' pain points and aspirations. 

The second thing is more of an individual idea, which is for each individual on your team to carve out some time to have that one-on-one conversation, not the big Zoom meeting or the BlueJeans meeting or whatever it is. One of the best ways you can signal that you really care about somebody – and this will help alleviate their anxiety – is if you try to understand what it is they need and what they want in their own careers at this point in time.

That could be starting to think about, “Well, within a year hopefully we’re on the other side and here’s what I’d like to do.” Or, “I have an aspiration to be a senior VP or a C-suite executive here” — to actually spend the time partnering, where you’re not only providing advice, but you’re actually helping them execute on this. For example, if somebody needs certain skills to get to the next stage, you help them figure out how they can get those skills. If that means a new assignment, a new opportunity, you do that.

That’s just good management of people. But when you do that, especially now, you’re demonstrating in a real way – not just with words, which are important – that you care about each individual person and you want them to succeed, and you want to understand what’s going on in their lives now, and work together to try to get them to the next stage, whatever that happens to be.

Retraining Workers as Jobs Evolve

Source: Pixabay

The Wall Street Journal published an interesting article today by Austen Hufford titled, "Companies Ramp Up Worker-Retraining Efforts."  Hufford explains that many firms are struggling to find good people given the very tight labor market.  Moreover, many jobs have evolved due to technology innovation.  Thus, companies have invested in new initiatives to retrain workers for their emerging needs.  As an example, Louisiana-based Lamar Advertising is retraining workers accustomed to painting billboards to now repair digital billboards.  These digital displays only account for a tiny fraction of the company's billboards, yet they generate more than 20% of the firm's billboard revenue.  

How should firms think about launching worker-retraining initiaves?  First, I think that companies have to recognize that these investments, while perhaps quite substantial, often pale in comparison to the alternative.  Firms have to weigh the cost of retraining against the extraordinary expenses that they often must incur to recruit and onboard new talent.   In high employee turnover situations, the recruiting and onboarding costs can be astronomical.   Retraining often proves to be a worthwhile investment when judged in this way.   Second, retraining efforts often yield other substantial benefits.   For instance, organizations may find that employee engagement increases when people feel valued and have the opportunity to better themselves through retraining.  Third, investing in internal retraining efforts enables companies to customize their worker training, development, and education to suit their organization's specific needs.   Finding talent from the outside often means that firms rely on training that is quite general and does not meet their particular needs.   Finally, retraining efforts enable dedicated employees to share their newly developed skills with others.  As people master new skills, they can become the trainers for the next group of workers who enter training programs.   Sharing expertise in this manner often has two important benefits.  It reinforces the skills that one has learned, while offering a tremendous sense of satisfaction and pride for workers.   

Alumni & The Recruiting Process

Scholars Jason Greenberg and Roberto Fernandez have conducted an interesting new study about job searches and MBA recruiting. They studied approximately 600 students from a top MBA program over two years.  They conducted the research from a sociological perspective, comparing students who landed jobs through connecting with alumni at various companies (search through social networks) to those students who were hired through formal on-campus recruiting programs (formal search).   They refer to connections with alumni as weak ties (i.e., the students did not necessarily know the alumni prior to the search process; they connected with them through a variety of networking activities).  They found that MBAs are much more likely to accept a job offer landed through alumni networking than through formal on-campus recruiting processes.   That's true, even though the compensation tended to be higher from offers derived through on-campus recruiting programs.   Why is the networking so influential and effective?  Those conversations and connections help the students understand the growth potential associated with a particular job, and that proves to be very important to many talented students... more important than compensation perhaps.   Here's an excerpt from the abstract of the academic paper that the scholars published:   

We find that contrary to conventional wisdom, search through social networks typically results in job offers with lower total compensation (-17 percent for referrals through strong ties and -16 percent for referrals via weak ties vs. formal search). However, our models also show that students are considerably more likely to accept offers derived via weak ties. They do so because they are perceived to have greater growth potential and other non-pecuniary value. On balance, our tests are consistent with Granovetter’s argument that networks provide value by facilitating access to information that is otherwise difficult to obtain, rather than providing greater pecuniary compensation.

What's the implication of this study?   Greenberg puts it this way:  “Based on our findings, recruiters earn a higher ROI when spending time and money on facilitating connections between current employees and potential recruits from their alma mater.   Students look to and trust an alumnus from their school who ‘looks like them in three years’ to provide inside information about growth opportunities within the firm. And that powerful association is a huge influencer when it comes time to accept or reject a job offer.”

Locating Near Talent Pools

The Wall Street Journal writes today that firms are increasingly weighing availability of talent as they make location decisions.  Here's an excerpt:

Fifty years ago, companies opened new locations to be near lumber, copper, or resources needed for their businesses. “Today, people are the natural resources,” said Meredith Amdur, an analytics expert at advisory firm CEB. Facing a tight labor market and a shortage of skilled workers, many large companies say that a city or region’s population of desirable workers is now the top factor in location decisions.

The focus on talent makes a great deal of sense. However, I think firms have to think in terms of identifying areas where hidden gems might exist.  Yes, if you want programmers, you will find a great deal of talent in San Francisco.  However, you will be battling many top firms for that talent, and it will be pricey.  What if another city was home to some terrific universities, but it had a less competitive labor market?  Or, what if some less "prestigious" universities actually were producing great and somewhat underrated talent?  That's what I mean by finding the hidden gems.  

Insiders vs. Outsiders: Sweeping Generalizations Don't Make Sense

I read an interesting blog post this week on the HBR site.  The post consists of an interview with Harvard Professor Gautum Mukunda.   Here is an excerpt (video posted below as well):

The finding: The best leaders tend to be outsiders who don’t have a great deal of experience.
 
The research: Gautam Mukunda studied political, business, and military leaders, categorizing them into two groups: “filtered leaders,” insiders whose careers followed a normal progression; and “unfiltered leaders,” who either were outsiders with little experience or got their jobs through fluke circumstances. He then compared the groups’ effectiveness; for instance, with U.S. presidents, he looked at historians’ rankings from the past 60 years. He discovered that the unfiltered leaders were the most effective—and also the least effective—while highly filtered leaders landed in the middle of the pack. 
 
The challenge: Is searching for a leader with a long, impressive résumé a waste of time? Is experience a predictor of mediocre performance? Professor Mukunda, defend your research.
 
Mukunda: I was surprised by how unambiguous the data were, but they confirmed what I suspected: If you choose an insider who you know can do the job well, most of the time that person won’t perform any differently from any other top candidate with lots of experience. Such insiders—I call them “filtered leaders”—might be good, but they probably won’t be brilliant. It’s the unfiltered leaders, the outsiders without lots of experience, who perform the very best.

I'm highly skeptical of such a sweeping generalization.  I don't think we can argue that outsiders are ALWAYS preferable to insiders, that unfiltered folks are always preferable to experienced individuals.    The bottom line is: It depends!  Certain circumstances call for an outsider or a person with fresh perspective, while others lend themselves to an insider or someone with deep experience in an industry or company. Each company needs to assess its situation and make the right choice for that organization, given its strategy and culture, AT THAT POINT IN TIME.  The right solution for Company XYZ in 2012 may not make sense in 2018, as conditions change.   Moreover, the search for that superstar outsider can be a futile one, as I've written about in earlier blog posts.  We sometimes become enamored with the outside "star" hire... and then feel very underwhelmed a few years later.  

The 10,000 Hours Misconception: Practice vs. Talent

Professors David Z. Hambrick and Elizabeth J. Meinz wrote a good article in the New York Times this weekend about the "10,000 hours" concept popularized by Malcolm Gladwell.   Actually, the idea of experts achieving world class status through 10,000 hours of practice comes from the excellent work of Florida State University Professor K. Anders Ericsson and his colleagues.  They have studied how world class violinists, chess players, athletes, and the like engage in deliberate practice to enhance their skills.  Ericsson has found that top people in these fields tend to engage in at least 10,000 hours of deliberate practice during their formative years.

Some people have interpreted this work to mean that talent doesn't matter much, that somehow one can become world class simply through hard work.   Here is how Hambrick and Meinz counter that conventional wisdom:

Research has shown that intellectual ability matters for success in many fields — and not just up to a point.  Exhibit A is a landmark study of intellectually precocious youths directed by the Vanderbilt University researchers David Lubinski and Camilla Benbow. They and their colleagues tracked the educational and occupational accomplishments of more than 2,000 people who as part of a youth talent search scored in the top 1 percent on the SAT by the age of 13. (Scores on the SAT correlate so highly with I.Q. that the psychologist Howard Gardner described it as a “thinly disguised” intelligence test.) The remarkable finding of their study is that, compared with the participants who were “only” in the 99.1 percentile for intellectual ability at age 12, those who were in the 99.9 percentile — the profoundly gifted — were between three and five times more likely to go on to earn a doctorate, secure a patent, publish an article in a scientific journal or publish a literary work. A high level of intellectual ability gives you an enormous real-world advantage. 

Hambrick and Meinz go on to explain that the high achievers that they studied tend to have a very high level of working memory capacity.   That attribute tends to matter, above and beyond how much one practices.  For example, when they studied pianists who had practiced the same amount of hours, they found that those with higher working memory capacity tended to perform better.   The scholars don't dispute that deliberate practice matters.  They simply remind us that talent still matters... a great deal.