Frankly, the headline in the Silicon Valley Business Journal put me off: “Nolan Bushnell, Steve Wozniak: The next Steve Jobs walks among us.” I figured it would be one of those articles that tout the “Lone Genius” myth or add to the Steve Jobs hagiography.
But I read the piece because I’ve found that Nolan Bushnell and Steve Wozniak both tend to say things worth remembering. I wasn’t disappointed. Here’s the money quote from Bushnell.
“You’ve probably already got the next Steve Jobs working for you and all the brilliance is ending up on the cutting-room floor.”
People are the one source of sustainable competitive advantage, so finding the ones who’re a good fit for your company is a challenge. Then it’s time for the talent development challenge.
The talent development challenge isn’t finding the one Lone Genius who will have the impact of a Steve Jobs. The talent development challenge is about helping everyone who works for you develop their individual genius in a productive way.
Great talent development programs help people make progress. They help people build expertise and develop relationships. It’s not about standing back and letting genius do its thing. It’s about providing challenges and resources that help people develop.
Some of those people will want to attain the C-Suite. Some will want to do significant research or excel at sales or meet demanding business challenges. Others will want to come in every day, do important work with people they like, make a little progress, and go home.
The talent development challenge is helping all those people do all those things better and better.
