Study: Being A Jerk Doesn’t Get Your Further Ahead In Life

The evidence is in: Nice guys and gals don't finish last, and being a selfish jerk doesn't get you ahead.

That’s the clear conclusion from research that tracked disagreeable people from college or graduate school to where they landed in their careers about 14 years later.

 

They surveyed the same people more than a decade later, asking about their power and rank in their workplaces, as well as the culture of their organizations. 

They also asked their co-workers to rate the study participants’ rank and workplace behaviour.  Across the board, they found those with selfish, deceitful, and aggressive personality traits were not more likely to have attained power than those who were generous, trustworthy, and generally nice.

 

That’s not to say that jerks don’t reach positions of power. It’s just that they didn’t get ahead faster than others, and being a jerk simply didn’t help.

 

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