Very intelligent but failure in the workplace?

[dublinruth]

I was a very clever child. Scholarships, MENSA, etc. Everyone thought I had an exceptionally bright future.

Except.. my intelligence doesn't really mean anything in the workplace. It hasn't translated to career success. I'm now ten years into my career, doing specialised admin work that bores me silly but pays OK.

Has anyone else found that being intelligent just doesn't translate into being good at work. I feel such a failure and see people I went to school with having great careers and can't help but to feel a huge amount of jealousy.

Has anyone else found this?

This all sounds very familiar to me, in fact I've just been to a school reunion, someone asked me what I did, I replied that I'm basically a housewife to which they replied " but you were really clever at school!".

I did well at art school but I do not flourish without structure and stall when left to my own devices, procrastination distractibility, overthinking, obsessions you name it I do it.
So, no glittering career but I am shit hot at quizzes and my team always wins, not a lot in the greater scheme of things but it helps my self esteem!

Im looking at minimu m wage jobs at the mo as I want part time work... and wondering how it went so badly wrong. Not that theres anything wrong with min wage jibs but Id love to use my brain and feel chalkeneged and achieve and earn some real money. Which in theory I can. But I cant see the leap to how. Or maybe its too late.

Jobs dont tend to just ask for super clever people... but experience in X or 2 years working in Y or training in Z..

Intelligence in adulthood has little to do with scholarships/Mensa/iq tests etc which has little to do with success at work. In order to be successful at work you need drive, commercial/industry awareness, good interpersonal skills etc etc. Obviously if someone is really intelligent these things loose revelance, if someone is fairly intelligent then they catch on and develop these skills fairly quickly.

@wigglybeezer I ended up at art school and completely pissed it up the wall without structure and proper instruction, are we the same person?

Self assurance for sure. I know a lot of people quite high up who talk the talk very well. Gets them noticed, they say the right stuff in meetings, etc. Everyone thinks highly of them. Then at times when you're having a one to one with them you realise they're winging it/don't know anywhere near as much as they give the impression they do.

Not all of them, but quite a few.

Yes! This is me, too.
I love my job and its occasionally technically complex. I wouldn't say my intelligence is wasted. But, its really not at all well paid.
I wouldn't be able to come on mums net and describe myself as "comfortable, but it's all about priorities really......and people have different outgoings.... its not much in London.... I drive an old banger"

There's a couple of reasons for this. Some of them related tangentially to my intelligence.

I have a tenancy towards anxiety, for example, that rules out any kind of leadership role.
I also got started on a working life a bit late after spending the first 10 years of adulthood down a far left rabbit hole of frenetic activism that didn't leave a lot of space for other concerns.

I'm not overly troubled by it. Probably the majority of intelligent people are not successful. And a large number of successful people aren't intelligent!

The world doesn't owe me anything because of an IQ score.

@pumpastrotter
We also have a streak of MH problems which go hand in hand. This is so true. In my case it has partly led to my lack of sucess in the workplace. There are other factors of course but for me the family support systems is just not there. In general, the emotional intelligence is a lot lower. Sometimes you need the support and advice of people around you to also succeed at work.

@SingleMumFighting absolutely. I have some incredibly well to do family members, but they come from very supported backgrounds and family money. Myself and my siblings were all very academic but none of us have done a thing with it, but then we had parents who would constantly tell us not to bother, everything was pointless, we'd fail anyway and put us all in care or we've been homeless, they gave us absolutely fuck all stability or support either monetary or emotionally and it really shows.

I've seen three of my cousins, siblings, turn out differently from what you'd expect: oldest and youngest very very bright, amazing academic records.

As adults they've both had very middling careers. But the middle one with no expectations is now a multi millionaire, runs multiple businesses, is on all sorts of boards and women in business forums, advising politicians about women in business etc etc. Would never have expected it when they finished school.

Yes this is me. I earn a good salary (ish), but am stagnating in a mediocre career where other people are flying ahead of me. I wish I had done something different because I think part of it is because I just don’t care. Also I have a lazy streak. I’ve never been promoted, have just moved to different companies to push ahead. And this all feels terrible when I write it down.

People with high emotional intelligence always fair better in the work place eg, climbing the career ladder..

Maybe work on that ?

I know what you mean. I’ve actuslly got a good professional job but I must admit that when I was younger I’d assumed that by this age I’d have more money!

Id be happy with the goodish salary right now! I havent managed that!

I think its funny on mn and irl when everyone is angling for their kids to be top set/top of the class/Russel group uni and Im kind of thinking, "its not all that." Id love to know how to support my kids to succeed where I havent. I'm aware we dont have the high flying friends and contacts in a way more monied types tend to.

I wonder. If you do well at school you generally need to keep quiet about it - you don’t boast if you come top of the class, you don’t sell yourself as your marks speak for you. At work those strategies don’t do you any favours.

I wonder if you’re all too intelligent to succeed - didn’t research find that there is a negative return to most phd’s for example? We’ve some seriously clever friends who’ve not been able to hold their noses with work strategies they didn’t agree with, bosses appropriating their work and ages moved from firm to firm without moving up. Work is partly a game of getting your boss to back you whilst also impressing their boss and that’s not just about how good you are at your job, being reliable and willing to pitch in even when clearly avoidable things go wrong is also important.

It’s also about finding what plays to your strengths and that’s hard to do, career advice isn’t skills based enough.

I wonder if the difference between high achievers who did well in the workplace and those who didn't is more down to the quality of our support networks? Those who struggle socially may well tend to be left high and dry in this respect, but they might have succeeded if they'd known the right people in the right field. It's well documented that women suffer more from this achievement gap than men because the expectations are different and contradictory, and the support is often just not there.

Another thing to bear in mind is that traditional, structured professions where you have a built in progression have been steadily eroded since the early 90s, and the alternative ways of working are not family friendly. Some of us lived through recessions with awful unemployment and never really got on the ladder. Some of us were discriminated against for other reasons; my hearing impairment I am sure put a lot of employers off (have only ever worked in places with strong equal opps policies) and I have a highly intelligent, quirky friend who has epilepsy and never had a paid job (she volunteers lots, though).

TL;DR: stop blaming yourselves!

Id definitely suit a career with inbuilt progression. Having a family and now wanting part time work for a bit is a pain though. Many people who qualified pre kids can drop down to part time.

I wonder if. T came easy to you at school op.you simply did the work, but your parents and teachers pushed for everything else.

In thr workplace, it's very different, it's about competing, having drive, ambition, thr interpersonal skills.

Your comment on it being boring, but paying ok, indicates to me, you lack drive and ambition, you thought it would all come to you, like it did at school, and it doesn't work like that in the workplace. And when it didn't, you did nothing about it.

Being intelligent is only a part of what brings workplace success.

@movinggoalposts right there with you with the alumni mag, aka "The Look What You Could Have Won But Didn't, Loser" leaflet...

Reasonably bright at school but afflicted with chronic indecision, procrastination and laziness when left to own devices. I am also not good at being a loud confident person which hasn't been helped by various bosses who frequently shot me down in flames.

Without going into my own saga yes, I was left to assume that because I worked hard in school and the top of the class that I would find it easy to get a good job and be very successful

In my experience there is little correlation between the two things

Not only that, you have to continually prioritise work, for years, to really succeed. It was much easier pre dc to travel and work long hours, I didn’t have a lot of hobbies etc to give up.

@Bluntness100

Are you like this in real life too?

I'm reasonably bright (IQ 140-ish) but I've ended up doing a low-paid manual job with awful hours. On the plus side, it's full-time work and pays my mortgage. My problem is lack if confidence and self-esteem. The people in my workplace who progress are cocky and self-assured and a bit thick, TBH.

"Reasonably bright at school but afflicted with chronic indecision, procrastination and laziness when left to own devices."

This was me. It still is to some extent but over time I have managed to get the hang of ignoring the massive paralysing surge of anxiety and just doing something rather than agonising over the perfect thing for weeks and then not finishing it. I found that gradually during my twenties by pushing myself really hard I managed to pick up the ability to make decisions with partial information, develop interpersonal skills, etc, in my own way. As I got a bit better that started to be a positive feedback loop as I felt more confidence that I would be capable of explaining myself succinctly if I got something wrong and needed help.

I don't think it is really laziness or lack of drive. I think it's difficulty with executive function. I think that can be developed over time. (Plus I also got better at recognising stuff that was a bad match for me).

I kinda feel like it took my twenties & a good chunk of my thirties to get the hang of work stuff - so I feel like now at nearing 50 I'm probably where someone else would have been at 35.