One of the most enduring conclusions that I drew based on the research and writing of Humanize was the idea that when it comes to leadership and management, we have no idea what we’re doing. Seriously, most of our “best practices” are completely made up. I think that we succeed in organizations more often IN SPITE of management, not because of it.

More and more research supports this idea. Today’s “Friday Quote” comes from the May 2014 issue of Harvard Business review, from some researchers that have evidence that using an algorithm to hire employees yields people who consistently outperform employees chosen by a human being:

Our analysis of 17 studies of applicant evaluations shows that a simple equation outperforms human decisions by at least 25%. The effect holds in any situation with a large number of candidates, regardless of whether the job is on the front line, in middle management, or (yes) the C-suite.