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Business
商業(yè)版塊
Bartleby
巴托比專欄
Dullness and its discontents
沉悶者及其不滿
Unshowy competence brings benefits as well as drawbacks
低頭做事既有好處也有壞處
The charismatic corporate climber is a common target for resentment in office life.
在辦公室里，魅力四射且拼命往上爬的人常常招來怨恨。
He—and research suggests men are particularly given to such narcissism—hogs the spotlight in meetings, is adept at grabbing undeserved glory, and is a pro at self-promotion.
他——研究表明，男性尤其容易自戀——在開會時喜歡博取關(guān)注，擅長搶奪本不屬于自己的榮譽，還是自我推銷的行家。
More often than not, he is the boss’s pet.
很多時候，他是老板的寵兒。
But he rises on the back of another, unsung, corporate archetype: the competent, diligent but unexciting achiever.
但他是靠著另一類默默無聞的公司員工努力工作才得以晉升的：這類人能干、勤奮，但平淡無奇。
Studies find that plenty of confident egomaniacs, unsuited to the subtleties of management, get a leg-up for being, well, confident egomaniacs.
研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，雖然許多自信的自大狂因心思不夠細(xì)膩而不適合做管理工作，但他們恰恰會因為自信自大而被往上拉一把。
Companies disproportionately promote narcissists.
公司會提拔相當(dāng)多的自戀者。
Perhaps a fifth of chief executives fit the description, researchers have found, a far higher proportion than within the wider population.
研究人員發(fā)現(xiàn)，首席執(zhí)行官之中，符合自戀描述的人占五分之一，這一比例遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)高于廣大人群中自戀者所占的比例。
Self-absorbed CEOs can sap morale and, evidence suggests, produce poor financial results.
以自我為中心的首席執(zhí)行官可能會挫傷士氣，而且有證據(jù)表明，他們也會造成財務(wù)業(yè)績不佳。
A strong case for the dull striver was made by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, a psychologist at University College London, in an article for the Harvard Business Review in 2015 entitled “The best managers are boring managers”.
倫敦大學(xué)學(xué)院的心理學(xué)家托馬斯·查莫羅-普雷穆季奇在2015年為《哈佛商業(yè)評論》撰寫了一篇文章，題為《最好的經(jīng)理人是無趣的經(jīng)理人》，文章為支持沉悶但努力的人進行了有力論證。
Understated competence does not intuitively scream leadership.
低調(diào)的才干不會直觀地表現(xiàn)為領(lǐng)導(dǎo)力。
Many totemic bosses of the age, from bankers to tech founders, come with big egos, showy antics and volatile tempers.
現(xiàn)今時代的許多圖騰式老板，從銀行家到科技公司創(chuàng)始人，都極其自負(fù)，愛嘩眾取寵，且脾氣反復(fù)無常。
Elon Musk may be accused of many things.
埃隆·馬斯克可能會受到許多批評。
Dullness is not one of them.
但沉悶并非其中之一。
Even so, Mr Chamorro-Premuzic argued, conscientious but unprepossessing characters tend to have little-noticed but precious advantages.
即便如此，查莫羅-普雷穆季奇認(rèn)為，勤勉認(rèn)真但平平無奇的人往往具有不易被察覺，但非常寶貴的優(yōu)勢。
They can be depended on to make decisions calmly, manage teams deftly and be emotionally mature.
人們可以信任他們會冷靜地做出決定，巧妙地管理團隊，并保持情感成熟。
They deserve promotion ahead of co-workers with “flash and vision, and bold displays of confidence”.
他們比那些“閃閃發(fā)光、有遠(yuǎn)見、大膽展示自信”的同事值得更早地得到晉升。
A seminal meta-analysis of research on leadership characteristics, published in 2002 by Timothy Judge, then at the University of Florida, and colleagues, indeed found a link between managerial effectiveness and personality traits such as being stable, agreeable and dependable.
2002年，當(dāng)時在佛羅里達(dá)大學(xué)工作的蒂莫西·賈奇及其同事發(fā)表了一項關(guān)于領(lǐng)導(dǎo)力特征研究的影響重大的元分析。該分析確實發(fā)現(xiàn)，管理效率與穩(wěn)定、隨和、可靠等人格特質(zhì)之間存在聯(lián)系。
One explanation is that level-headedness makes it easier to deal coolly with the many subtle problems thrown up by human beings (who may all too easily infuriate a more volatile manager).
一種解釋是，冷靜的頭腦更容易冷靜地處理人類引發(fā)的許多微妙問題(人類要激怒一個更反復(fù)無常的經(jīng)理可太容易了)。
Emotional maturity is also an indicator of trustworthiness.
情緒成熟也是值得信賴的一個標(biāo)志。
Studies have found that managers with dysfunctional traits such as narcissism are likelier to get up to no good.
研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，具有自戀等功能障礙特征的管理者更有可能做出不好的事情。
Conscientious bosses, by contrast, score highly for integrity.
相比之下，勤勉認(rèn)真的老板在為人正直方面得分很高。
The dull but diligent could be especially valuable now.
那些沉悶但勤奮的人現(xiàn)在可能格外有價值。
As companies claim increasingly to prize soft skills, such as being able to communicate well with all sorts of people, emotionally intelligent workers ought to be in demand.
隨著公司越來越看重軟技能，比如能夠與各種人很好地溝通，情商高的員工應(yīng)該會受到歡迎。
A volatile business environment in which firms face problems from recession to climate change, pandemics and war, favours the steady leader.
在動蕩的商業(yè)環(huán)境中，公司面臨著從衰退到氣候變化、流行病、戰(zhàn)爭等各種問題，在這種情況下穩(wěn)重的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者會受到青睞。
Chief executives face tricky decisions about how much risk to take in pursuit of growth, as shareholders look on nervously.
在股東們緊張的目光注視下，首席執(zhí)行官們面臨棘手的決定，即為了追求增長要承擔(dān)多大風(fēng)險。
Startup bosses who proudly moved fast and broke things are now falling over themselves to look demure.
那些以行動迅速、摧枯拉朽為傲的初創(chuàng)公司老板們，現(xiàn)在正前赴后繼地讓自己看起來嚴(yán)肅莊重。
“We are a very boring company,” Oliver Merkel, head of Flink, a grocery-delivery startup, bragged to the Financial Times recently.
“我們是一家非常無趣的公司。”食品雜貨快遞初創(chuàng)公司Flink的老板奧利弗·默克爾最近這樣向《金融時報》吹噓。
The trend is visible in politics, too.
這一趨勢在政壇也很明顯。
Joe Biden in America and Rishi Sunak in Britain rose to their countries’ top jobs partly because their boring dependability promised relief from their predecessors’ noisy incompetence.
美國的約瑟夫·拜登和英國的里希·蘇納克成為各自國家的最高領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人，部分原因是他們無趣但可靠的個性很有可能會把人民從喧囂但無能的前任中解救出來。
Testing times call for cool heads.
充滿考驗的時代需要冷靜的頭腦。
For all that, quietly competent types hoping for greater appreciation (and remuneration) should not sit still.
盡管如此，希望得到更多賞識(和薪酬)的沉默能干的人不應(yīng)安坐等待。
To rise up the ranks, the boring would do well to raise their profiles, whether by speaking up in meetings or talking up their accomplishments.
要提升自己的地位，沉悶無趣的人最好提高自己的存在感，可以在開會時大膽發(fā)言，也可以夸一夸自己的成就。
If they bag bigger jobs they will anyway need to master show-offy things like glad-handing clients, chairing meetings and holding forth on strategy.
如果他們坐到更高的位置，他們無論如何都需要學(xué)會一些裝腔作勢的事，比如對客戶笑臉相迎、主持會議和提出戰(zhàn)略。
Though Mr Judge’s analysis revealed emotional stability and general diligence were crucial to managerial effectiveness, extrovert qualities such as sociability were also telling factors.
雖然賈奇的分析顯示，情緒穩(wěn)定和勤奮對管理效率至關(guān)重要，但善于社交等外向品質(zhì)也是重要因素。
Companies’ penchant for promoting the wrong people is deeply ingrained, despite management theorists’ admonitions.
盡管管理學(xué)理論家經(jīng)常發(fā)出告誡，但公司喜歡提拔不合適的人的現(xiàn)象依然根深蒂固。
By default, many of those dishing out promotions are themselves narcissists who advanced by wowing their superiors.
一般情況下，許多提拔員工的人本身就是自戀者，他們就是通過在上級面前表現(xiàn)自己來獲得晉升的。
And showy sorts’ shameless self-aggrandisement fulfils a convenient function for bosses, giving them a shortcut—no matter how misleading—to finding candidates for elevation.
而且，愛表現(xiàn)的人毫不臉紅地自吹自擂，這為老板們提供了一種便利，為他們提供了一條尋找升職候選人的捷徑——無論這種捷徑有多大的誤導(dǎo)性。
Many managers are too busy to patiently unearth genuine talent.
許多經(jīng)理太忙了，沒耐心挖掘真正的人才。
After all, they have other important things on their plates—like impressing their own bosses.
畢竟，他們手頭還有其他重要的事情要做——比如給自己的老板留下好印象。
