Me Versus Average
What is the relevant bogie, and how do I stack up?
Inspired by the third cognitive bias, “the better-than-average effect,” that Steve Stewart-Williams identifies in his post, I offer this partial list by self assessment of where I’m better and worse than average. I am sure outside opinions might differ.
The bias as he explains it:
Most people think they’re better than average on every socially desirable trait: intelligence, honesty, sense of humor, you name it. The laws of logic dictate, however, that not everyone can be right about this. One of my favorite recent examples of the better-than-average effect is that most people believe they’d defy immoral orders from an authority, despite evidence from Stanley Milgram and others that most people simply obey them. My all-time favorite example, however, is that prisoners think they’re more moral, more dependable, and more trustworthy than non-prisoners - and even that they’re equally law-abiding.
The purpose of this exercise is to attempt a critical reflection forcing me to consider my true above-average attributes and below-average limitations. I invite readers to do the same for themselves. This is hard not just because of the very cognitive bias Stewart-Williams points out. Sure, it is tough to be honest with yourself, but it is tough in both directions. And it is hard to actually know what the population average actually is.
In this I want to think about meaningful areas to examine. That introduces its own difficulty as well as potential bias—what I think is meaningful might not be or only is in a certain framing. This is especially so in considering the opposite bias of the Dunning-Kruger Effect—where people underestimate their abilities. Compounding it more so is the egocentric spotlight effect of assuming others are thinking about you (and what you’ve done and what you can do) as much as you think about it yourself.
It seems it is biases all the way down. Nevertheless . . .
Driving - This is the classic example. And this offers a great opportunity to show how this entire process is usually confused because it is wrong to think only in terms of one linear dimension on these. Each has nuance. Thus, we need to provide context so that we can actually compare apples to apples. I will break it down to three subcategories which are by no means exhaustive.
Safety - My grade: slightly below average. My driving record is pretty good, especially adjusted for miles driven—about twice the U.S. average. However, I cannot think that my tendency to slightly speed, be distracted by my phone, and rely on my skills (see below) don’t reduce my safety measure.
Skills - My grade: above average. Like I said, very few wrecks or tickets and none for quite a while given the amount I drive plus my observation of choices I make on the road versus what I think I see from most around me show better-than-average skill. I feel like I have a generally better ability to see what is going on from others. Thus, I feel empowered to drive a bit faster than the average driver (worsening safety) while certainly not being the fastest fool on the road.
Navigation - My grade: above average. This extends beyond the driving category. I have almost never been lost (I’ve long planned a post on this).
Investing - In some cases we get an impartial evaluation on this that is black and white—you either make money or you don’t. But even when we do, context matters. Did you make money is not so easily an answered question.
Helping others - My grade: highly above average. This better be the case since it is what I do professionally. The chief way I do this and do it well is getting people invested in a way appropriate for them very specifically and then helping to keep them invested appropriately incorporating relevant changes along the way. This extends to myself personally too, which is actually harder than it may seem since my (self-perceived) abilities here tend to push me to take risks I rightly avoid for others. In the manner that I excel in the next item is how and why I am good at my job in this item.
Finding and exploiting trading opportunities - My grade: above average. This is actually not what I do professionally despite many assuming that is what most of us do in investment management. In truth most do not do this in financial services. For those who do, overwhelmingly most do not do it well. This is highly nuanced and raises a big question in me claiming to be above average at it. Let me be clear: It is extraordinarily difficult to consistently beat the market. And I have very little to offer here. But while most attempt to play the game of beating a broad-market benchmark, I’m smart enough (I know my limitations) to avoid playing that game. Where I am above average is in assessing risk (broadly defined), appreciating the merits and drawbacks of both concentrations and diversifications, finding and exposing oneself to good call options (more metaphorical than literal), and seeing a good bet and being willing to take it. Which leads into . . .
Market making - My grade: above average. I believe I am better than most at seeing where opportunities (financial and otherwise) lie and combinations can be made. Sometimes this is an arbitrage, but most often it is simply gains from trade (win-win situations). Which leads into . . .
Negotiation - To be clear I fail at this quite often, but so do most all of us. So at the least I’m making a claim about my relative skill—in keeping with the exercise of this post. Numeracy and ability to properly define objectives (and keep them in focus) helps here. So too does empathy or simply being creative enough to see others’ perspectives.
My grade: above average.
Exercising discretion in sharing my opinions - Basically, how well do I choose when to keep my thoughts to myself or share my point of view? This would include how I go about doing it and to what degree I do it. I am quite willing to share my opinions—whether solicited or not, whether appropriate or not. This is done to an extent that is a failing. I mean that in a moral failing sense irrespective of it also being likely a professional/social failing—people don’t want to know, so this holds me back. Still, I have this natural disposition because I am inquisitive, I expect others are as well, and I have a thick-skin approach to life. I’m also very honest and open such that I feel not sharing is a form of or adjacent to dishonesty.
My grade: below average.
Ethics - I would like to think and in fact do that being a CFA charterholder indicates ethicality given how important it is in passing and maintaining the credential in good standing. Beyond that, I have always been very interested in the study of ethics from the philosophical to the practical. I know enough to appreciate how difficult the topic is. That in itself might set me apart.
My grade: above average.
Conscientiousness and compassion - This is getting very self flattering. I’m uneasy about that to say the least. And isn’t that a wonderful way to claim a conscientious character? Well, no. Conscientiousness can be about benefits to oneself as much as others. The key is balance. These two are grouped together as I think virtue in one reflects upon the other. I’ve written before about my empathetic nature and the role of compassion.
My grade: above average.
Conformity - Here I will argue that too much of this is itself a bad, and the time, manner, and place can completely reverse when above or below average is the better quality. My general demeanor is rebel rather than obedient. Yet I am respectful and dutiful rather than troublesome and shirking—your mileage with me may vary.
My grade: below average—in good ways and bad.
Generosity - Brutal honesty demands I fess up to both selfish inclinations and reluctance to fulfill spiritual (religious and otherwise) demands. I “TREAT YO SELF” more than I should. Yes, this pushes back against many of my answers above. It is also a recurring sub-theme of this post.
My grade: below average.
Writing - We write for others, yet writing is inherently personal. And whenever I’m disappointed in the popularity or reception of my personal writing, I fall back on the credo that I write for myself first. Has there ever been a never-widely-discovered yet prolific writer who was able to take this reassurance proudly to the grave? How would we know? Imagine a Michael Lewis or Tyler Cowen or Stephen King who just kept at it but never caught on perhaps only to be discovered years, decades, centuries after their passing. Maybe AI will resurrect these treasures for later appreciation in memoriam.
Business/professional - My grade: above average. I’ve received enough direct and indirect feedback throughout my career to have high confidence in this score. This matches my own self reflection upon rereading something I’ve written—most importantly when that was something from long ago.
Nonfiction/thematic/informational (this blog generally goes here) - My grade: above average. Where opinions can reasonably differ for those judging me based on my full body of work at Magnitude Matters, they should give some grace for the fact that I try to reach different audiences within the same space. Sometimes I am writing for you and sometimes I am writing for someone else. Maybe that is an error in design/execution, but I think I do most of it pretty well.
Fiction - My grade: above average. For now you’ll have to take my word for it. I’ve done very little of this, but I have confidence in it based on . . . well, I think I know good writing. What I probably underappreciate is my need for a full-blown, highly (constructively) critical editor in this among all writing areas. Someday I may have the time and energy to pursue writing fiction. AI might help as I am most confident that I have good general thoughts on plot and story arcs—the devil is in filling in the essential details.
Tone - This one is tricky for all of us as it is hard to know what we sound like to others. The analogue is how listening to one’s recorded voice sounds different than it does in one’s head—and are there any examples of people who think they sound better in external playback than they do in their own head?
My grade: very below average. I am tone deaf. It is clear from feedback from others as well as when I do make the effort for deep reflection that I am much harsher and abrasive than I intend to be. This is probably a feature when it comes to attempts at sarcastic humor for which I do excel. However, it is a big limitation the remaining 97% of the time I am trying to communicate verbally. Compounding the issue is that I proudly suffer no fools; where I need help is in delivery (while others need help the suffering part). What is ironic is that I actually am very good at perceiving tone problems by others even when it is subtle—I can tell when a listener (reader) is going to or has misinterpreted the intent of a speaker (writer). Am I oblivious to it in myself because it is inherently hard or because I am too lazy or too selfish to care?
Athletics - If it wasn’t for my genetic limitations, lack of training, or unwillingness to practice, I’d be a great athlete. Seriously though, this one is hard to assess because the relevant comparison group has to be defined—true in all cases but certainly in athletics. So let’s break this down a bit:
General athleticism - My grade: above average. Strength, endurance (especially), coordination (crucially), and reaction time are all qualities that I have always had more so than the average person. I am below average in height, which holds me back but also forces me to work harder making it a virtue for improvement. As the adage goes regarding fighting a short guy, “he didn’t wake up short,” meaning don’t underestimate him. I’m not claiming to be much of a fighter, though, either in ability or willingness. What I will claim is that I can beat most in a track event and can hold my own with any ball.1
Sports performance in competition - My grade: above average. This gets to the heart of the relevant comparison group issue. Just because you are faster than ~4 billion people currently on Earth doesn’t necessarily make you fast. So without working through a near-infinite delineation of all types of competition at all levels, I’ll summarize to say I am above average. A good microcosm here is that at my peak (circa 1999) I was ranked 50th in the world in air hockey. I could beat +99.9% of humanity, but I was a dead mallet against the great Venezuelans (like Jose Mora) and other masters (like Tim Weissman) of the time. Similarly if not to the same degree, I can play most sports very well against most people who play that sport while not being anywhere close to a top elite level. Basketball, an example that will get less laughs than air hockey, is a sport I will surprise you in—don’t sleep on me when selecting the pick-up team. But I never could make a D-1 college’s starting roster.
Sense of humor - Everybody thinks they have a great sense of humor, but as Marie says . . .
My grade: highly above average. Analogous to investment acumen, we get an obvious grade on this in two ways: Getting laughs (performance feedback) and aligning with what is popularly agreed upon as humorous (keeping clients). Sure, there is circularity in the latter, but if that doesn’t count, then there is basically no way to evaluate it. I know how to make people laugh (broadly defined). I also have range whereby I can change styles entirely for a given situation. The fact that some of my very well received humor among some audiences/situations would be very much rejected among others and yet in those others I can also be humorous demonstrates my range as strong—how many big fans knew Bob Saget worked blue?
Mathematics - This one might surprise you. That is because people seem to ascribe a higher level of mathematical skill to me than I think I actually have. Perhaps that is because I know enough to know what I don’t know about math even as that indicates I know more than the average Joe. So, I do think I’m above average. I just am fairly certain it is not as high as you may think.
My grade: above average.
Spelling - This skill is overrated, and I believe that not because of my personal inability here (I thing). It is clear from how often I need the help of modern tools (lookups and error checks) that my skills here are low. That said, I certainly have an above average vocabulary. So, perhaps graded on a scale I’m not so bad? No, I need help with this quite a bit including with widely-used words because I am not good at it.
My rating: below average.
Dancing - One’s willingness to do something is generally proportional to one’s ability to do it confidently. Confidence often but not always comes from actual skill. Skill takes actual ability plus practice. I score low on the first and very low on the second. Yet my natural disposition to have virtually no inhibitions cuts against this sharply.
My grade: below average. I’m no Elaine, but like Elaine I’m also no wallflower.
Technology - Here again is a place where willingness to try and to keep up with the times correlates with skill but not perfectly so. It also is a wide-ranging topic.
General usage - My grade: above average. Admittedly this is graded on a curve against the low-hanging fruit. I can quickly hit my limits—analogous to the athletics section above but lower for me in this case. There is a reason my family calls me “Hong-Kong IT”.2 Think beyond computers as this gets to physical technology including equipment. But it is in (some) areas of pure software where I truly excel (pun intended—I am definitely in the top 99.999% of the world using spreadsheets (I have a 75MB Excel workbook that proves it)). I also score highly in efficiency and effectiveness when it comes to security and data management (backup). This is not a challenge to any would-be jerks to test me on this. I am quite certain I am hackable—you win! leave me alone.
Willingness to try - My grade: above average. I am an early adopter.
Choosing where to spend my time - This is a very important and constant trade-off decision we all face. I preach “value your time!”. Yet I fear I am the essence of the cobbler with shoeless children. That is a metaphor that hits too close to home. How many times have I failed (am I continuing to fail) my children with my faults in this category?3
My grade: below average. I’ve spent a lot of time on this post. While I think it is fun and a good exercise, I suspect it is yet another self indulgence run amok. More generally, I used to be in default-setting NO when I was younger. Not for lack of desire but for unreasonable fear of change, rejection, failure, etc. This is when one should be default YES. Now when I should be Sivers’ “If it isn’t ‘Hell, YEAH! it is No,” I am default-setting YES. This leads me to be overextended. My completionism compounds the problem. I need to quit more things.
Gardening - gardening? Is this really meaningful? Sure it is. It is one of the most popular hobbies. It provides lots of positive externalities—when done well or when done very poorly for those who want a favorable comparison. For many of us and me in particular it is a test of our abilities to be patient, apply planning, and engage in a realm we don’t otherwise have much experience—most people aren’t farmers any longer.
My grade: below average. My yard and gardens are definitely above average, but that is not because of my skills. It is because I spend money on it. Yes, I do a lot of the work myself, but maintenance and great gardening are not the same thing. And if you’re looking for me for food in the apocalypse, I’ll only be of assistance as a market-maker middleman (see investing section above).
I’ll stop there hoping this is not too self indulgent. I do think it was a helpful exercise especially knowing I would share it publicly, and I encourage you to do a similar self evaluation periodically.
Golf balls don’t count, LOL. Seriously, I think with practice I could be above average here too. After all, my brother is, and we stack up similarly in all other sports.
I am so depended upon to help out that I was once called upon when travelling in Hong Kong to help troubleshoot a personal tech problem back home—12-hour time difference notwithstanding.
This is actually the last item I typed in making this post. I’m gong to put it down now and literally do something for one of my kids . . . well, maybe I’ll do a quick editing reread first . . .