Surrounded by Idiots
If you’re a Donald Trump fan, read no further. You won’t like this, not because it’s a direct attack on the Great Orange One, but because he’s such a wonderful example of the principle we’re about to consider.
When I was in legal practice I knew many a counsel who wanted the world to know all their clients were idiots. In fact, for a few, even their partners, their associates, and their staff were idiots. Not to mention their spouses and their kids. Being the only bright light in a room full of dull bulbs must be a trying burden, indeed.
When their cases didn’t do so well, it was obvious that the fault lay with the stupid judge, the clowns on the jury, or the lying witnesses, including their own. When they were called out for misrepresenting the principle of a case, they laid the blame on the editor of the headnote. Wrong citation? Incompetent law student. Errors in the appeal brief? Fire your assistant!
Those who practice in the medical malpractice field just love it when the doctor in question thinks himself to be God. (No sacrilege intended, and I use “he” deliberately, because it usually is a “he”. Worshiping one’s own magnificence seems to be a Y chromosome thing.) The Divine Surgeon will fault the anesthesiologist, the x-ray tech, and the scrub nurse, but never, never, never a chance that leaving the scope in a body cavity had anything to do with him. The stupid patient probably put it there himself, hoping to cash in on a lawsuit.
The list of bumbling fools who worked for, and then betrayed, the Donald is endless. They all started out as part of the “only the best people” team, but every one of them broke down to display weaknesses which were clearly impossible to detect in advance. On the day they forgot to say, “Yes, Sir! Very good, Sir!”, their perfidy and their incompetence were laid bare and they were cashiered. Public servants got their severance, private actors got stiffed.
Megalomaniacs and narcissists, regretfully, will always be with us, and by dint of their self-evaluation, frequently push themselves into positions of power and authority. Your chances of avoiding them are slim. What you don’t have to do is take what they dish out, nor do you have to play on their teams.
One narcissist will ruin any project or enterprise, be it a law partnership, a software company, an engineering firm, or a bakery. The self-important one, surrounded by idiots (that includes you, by the way) will hijack the success of the business for his own self-aggrandizement until one day there is a crisis where the deity in question will pull down the whole edifice, Samson style.
The rule for dealing with narcissists and megalomaniacs is simple: don’t. Don’t go into partnership with one. Don’t marry one. Don’t do business with one. Don’t take one on as a client. There are another 7,999,999,999 people in the world, most of whom are reasonable.
In truth, narcissists are surrounded by idiots. Just don’t be one of them.