Failure™ Magazine

Pay For Performance, Stupid

What suits can learn from the summer’s hottest baseball book, “Moneyball.”

Written by Jason Zasky   Filed under Business, Sports

There’s an old axiom that says, “What looks good, isn’t always good for you.” Although most people immediately associate this phrase with fatty foods, it’s also worth remembering when evaluating potential employees. In “Moneyball: The Art of Winning An Unfair Game” (W.W. Norton), author Michael Lewis has created a runaway bestseller simply by illustrating how Major League Baseball executives have long failed to heed this advice. In a nutshell, the book deftly explains why traditional yardsticks for measuring baseball prospects are hopelessly inadequate—and why most general managers and scouts stubbornly refuse to acknowledge this fact, despite the abundant evidence. Of course, executives and personnel people in less glamourous businesses also struggle to evaluate prospects, relying heavily on résumés to screen candidates—a system that makes the hiring process as much of a crapshoot as the baseball draft. Incredibly, what virtually all employers neglect to consider is past achievement, perhaps the best indicator of future success.

According to Lewis, “Moneyball” was inspired by a single question: “How did one of the poorest teams in baseball, the Oakland Athletics, win so many games?” He found the answer in general manager Billy Beane, an intense individual who was inspired in part by his own baseball failures to break the rules for evaluating players. A former first-round draft pick of the New York Mets, Beane was once considered an elite prospect, on par with former Mets star Darryl Strawberry (the first player selected in the 1980 amateur draft). Believe it or not, scouts not only loved Beane’s skills and physique, they felt he had “the Good Face”—yes, scouts unwittingly use physiognomy—believing that his facial structure was indicative of character. But the Mets disregarded several warning signs, ignoring the fact that Beane indicated a lack of desire to play professional baseball. Of equal concern was his temper, which flared up on the rare occasions when he wasn’t successful on the field. Some wondered how he would react when faced with the inevitable setbacks experienced by all young professional players.

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