assholes and prima donnas (you need a few)

My current employer has been doing some decent renovations at our offices and I stumbled into a "library" on one of the newly jazzed up floors.  You know, one of those rooms that have a bunch of bookshelves that everyone put all of their old & crappy books they just don't want anymore.    The last time I was in this room I saw a book with a catchy title; The No Asshole Rule.  I can't say that I have read it and based on the 4-star review average on Amazon I'm assuming it is a good book.  It did, however, remind me of something from my last job.

We had a long no-hire period and I got excited when we finally have the opportunity to hire some fresh new faces due to some openings one of our senior leaders created.  My enthusiasm simmered down a bit when this gentleman pontificated that we need to only hire folks that "fit in with our culture" and he absolutely declared, "no assholes or prima donnas".  As for me... I'm thinking I want a few assholes and prima donnas on my team!

The senior leader advocating this approach failed to realize a couple of things.  First, the culture of "sameness" and (faux) "can-do attitudes" we had simply forced the staff to only talk among themselves, and not to their leaders, about the things bothering them in the organization.  This makes it difficult for leaders to fix things that aren't coming to their attention.  Of course, any leader worth their salt would feel a bit awkward if NOBODY was EVER coming to them with ANY TYPE OF COMPLAINT.

I'm not advocating a season of Total Drama Island, but seriously, when was the last time that everyone on your team was perfectly happy about everything.  I believe that you need a healthy mix of different kinds of folks to get a stellar team.  While I've been lucky to lead (and be part of part) of a couple of high performing teams where everyone's skills were almost identical and nobody had an attitude at all, there are some great teams who are great because they have a couple of assholes and/or prima donnas in their ranks.

Assholes and prima donnas can only get away with being the folks they are if they perform, and they usually perform so well that they know it -- hence, they turn up the "attitude".  Heck, even General George S. Patton said, "all very successful commanders are prima donnas and must be so treated."  He also admitted being a prima donna himself and I'm sure I'm not alone when I think that he was called an asshole a couple of times! 

Assholes stir things up when they need to be.  If they see something stupid happening, they call it out.  They don't have time for nonsense.  I want an asshole, or two, on my project instead of a bunch of "yes men".  Prima Donnas are the superstars of your team.  Let them puff up their feathers.  Let the other team members know that if they rock, then you'll put up with their crap, too!

With all of that said, I'm proud to say I'm a bit of an asshole, too, and I'm surely a prima donna.  I challenge you to look within yourself and the folks you admire in your organization to see if they just might be assholes and/or prima donnas.  Are they the ones driving the bus?  Is your organization better off because of them?  Despite their problems, would you ever want them to leave?