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stack ranking != ranking. Even at El Goog, 50% of the headcount is performing below average.

> 50%

Only if the average equals the median. There is a low probability that they are equal if you randomly pick a distribution from the set of all possible distributions (and round the percentages to the nearest integer).

Edit: I am not a statistician so maybe the above is totally incorrect. The myth half of a sample is below the average triggers me every time!! Sorry.

But then you're falling for the myth that average is synonymous with mean. Median is an average, too.

That's my point - it's a misleading statistic. If you have a cohort of geniuses, half of them are still going to be very smart. The premise of stack ranking is you fire the bottom tier.

Huh, interesting, I don't believe that's consistent with Google's use of the term from what I remember, but that does seem to be the meaning I'm finding now.

So yeah, fair enough, I do just mean "ranking" I guess.

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