Could it be that experience doesn’t just produce skill, but also a perceived lack of skill - even in highly successful people? This is the question posed by this piece by Patrick Barclay.
He says that Manyoo might not want Jose Mourinho to be their next manager because he does not produce teams that play attractive football with home-grown talent.
But Mourinho can plausibly claim that these shortcomings are the product not of a lack of skill or disposition on his part, but are instead due simply to the opportunities he’s had. At Porto, he was an unproven manager and so needed to prove himself quickly. At Chelsea, his plutocratic owner demanded instant success. And at Inter, well, no manager lasts long enough these days to build from the ground up.
It’s possible then, that “Mourinho’s weaknesses” are no such thing. In adapting (very well) to his circumstances, some of his potential skills have if not atrophied then simply not been displayed.
This point, I think, generalizes. Maybe we often attribute to a person strengths and weaknesses that are in fact simply adaptation to circumstances. It’s the fundamental attribution error.
Take, for example, my game of economics writing. I suspect the differences between my writing and, say that of Larry Elliott, Martin Wolf or even Fraser Nelson are due not so much to differences in our personalities but to differences in who we write for. If I were writing for the FT, I’d write a bit like Martin and if I were writing for the Speccie, I’d write like Fraser - and vice versa. People often say “Wolf has written a good piece” or “Nelson has written a stinker”. But it might be more accurate to say “that space in the FT (Speccie) has produced a good (awful) piece.”
You might object here that we choose jobs that we find congenial. Mourinho chose jobs that require instant, pragmatic success, I chose to work for the IC rather than Guardian or Speccie, and so on.
I’m not sure. It’s equally possible that the opposite is the case. We fall into things, or get what we can, and then our preferences - maybe our characters generally - adapt to our circumstances. Our jobs create us, not (just) vice versa. Our talents, and weaknesses, aren’t the result of innate dispositions but rather are path-dependent.
Now, I personally have no great cause for complaint here. But I suspect that the millions of people trapped in drudge work might, and would sympathize with Ian Dury‘s sentiments. Maybe the meritocratic idea that people should go as far as their talents will take them is an impossible ideal - because even success requires that talents not be manifested.
He says that Manyoo might not want Jose Mourinho to be their next manager because he does not produce teams that play attractive football with home-grown talent.
But Mourinho can plausibly claim that these shortcomings are the product not of a lack of skill or disposition on his part, but are instead due simply to the opportunities he’s had. At Porto, he was an unproven manager and so needed to prove himself quickly. At Chelsea, his plutocratic owner demanded instant success. And at Inter, well, no manager lasts long enough these days to build from the ground up.
It’s possible then, that “Mourinho’s weaknesses” are no such thing. In adapting (very well) to his circumstances, some of his potential skills have if not atrophied then simply not been displayed.
This point, I think, generalizes. Maybe we often attribute to a person strengths and weaknesses that are in fact simply adaptation to circumstances. It’s the fundamental attribution error.
Take, for example, my game of economics writing. I suspect the differences between my writing and, say that of Larry Elliott, Martin Wolf or even Fraser Nelson are due not so much to differences in our personalities but to differences in who we write for. If I were writing for the FT, I’d write a bit like Martin and if I were writing for the Speccie, I’d write like Fraser - and vice versa. People often say “Wolf has written a good piece” or “Nelson has written a stinker”. But it might be more accurate to say “that space in the FT (Speccie) has produced a good (awful) piece.”
You might object here that we choose jobs that we find congenial. Mourinho chose jobs that require instant, pragmatic success, I chose to work for the IC rather than Guardian or Speccie, and so on.
I’m not sure. It’s equally possible that the opposite is the case. We fall into things, or get what we can, and then our preferences - maybe our characters generally - adapt to our circumstances. Our jobs create us, not (just) vice versa. Our talents, and weaknesses, aren’t the result of innate dispositions but rather are path-dependent.
Now, I personally have no great cause for complaint here. But I suspect that the millions of people trapped in drudge work might, and would sympathize with Ian Dury‘s sentiments. Maybe the meritocratic idea that people should go as far as their talents will take them is an impossible ideal - because even success requires that talents not be manifested.
"Is Chris Dillow trapped in drudge politics?" Seems to the question from the previuos post.Or am I? -Lib since 1951.
Events condition us differently. A confriming moment for me as a Liberal was when the nascent nastiness against Peter Thatchell got slapped down hard by the Liberal party.
Posted by: David Heigham | April 24, 2010 at 01:16 PM
Please don't test your theory by getting Fraser to write a guest spot on this blog.
Posted by: Tom Freeman | April 24, 2010 at 01:23 PM
Are there more reader friendly discussions of cognitive bias than Wikipedia? I'm thinking of something like Taleb's Black Swan theory -- a readable work that made you feel foolish if you didn't take the effort to follow the appendices.
Please note that I do not seek recommendations for Malcolm Gladwell, except as an example of bias.
Posted by: charlieman | April 25, 2010 at 06:16 PM
Wolf is really poor, most of his arguements are quite unimaginative; even amongst the right-of-centre FT crowd he is by far the worst commentator and his books banging on about the benefits of Globalisation are second-rate compared to other pro-globalisers like Easterly or Rodrik.
Mourinho's style of football is defensive football, he prioritises results over style or attractiveness of play. Some managers like Wneger came in and had immediate success while playing a more flowing style of football. Which isn't to say that Mourinho can't do it, just that he isn't at his strongest at it. Besides at Inter he faced none of the pressure you cited and inherited a team that was dominant in the Serie A but the style hasn't really changed.
Posted by: Lazynative | April 26, 2010 at 11:27 AM
isn't this a bit of a nature or nurture question? the answer to which being: both
Posted by: Luis Enrique | April 26, 2010 at 12:51 PM