PayPal says workers with ASD more effective than with MBAs

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PayPal co-founder says workers with Asperger?s more effective than workers with MBA

San Francisco ? In a conference hosted by Reaching Out MBA held Oct. 4, PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, pointed out to his audience why workers with Asperger?s syndrome are more likely to reach their full potential in the business world compared to workers who have gained an MBA.

Thiel made a number of thought-provoking statements during the promotional conference of his book, ?Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future?. In his book, Thiel suggests that people without an Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) often walk out on ideas, that might at first seem strange, which becomes their weakness. Thiel perceives that successful ideas are often the unconventional, strange ones.

The PayPal co-founder also emphasized that the workers with Asperger?s are often behind the most successful companies as they are not intimidated by the off-beat ideas that they often come up with.

In ?Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future?, Thiel also argued that competitiveness hinders one?s chance to come up with unique and unparalleled ideas, as competition pressures every competitor to come up with an idea that?s almost entirely the same in concept as their rivals.

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The original article by Natalie Kitroeff on the Bloomberg Businessweek website can be read here >>> http://www.businessweek.com/articles/20 ... -aspergers?

I've had more ideas stolen from me than I can shake a stick at.

I don't know her neurology but I think this CEO who is revolutionizing blood testing is on the spectrum.

http://fortune.com/2014/06/12/theranos-blood-holmes/

There is a video interview in the article.


"She looks like 19,? says board member Henry Kissinger, 91.

Asked to assess her as a leader?because he?s seen a few?he responds, ?I can?t compare her to anyone else because I haven?t seen anyone with her special attributes. She has iron will, strong determination. But nothing dramatic. There is no performance associated with her. I have seen no sign that financial gain is of any interest to her. She?s like a monk. She isn?t flashy. She wouldn?t walk into a room and take it over. But she would once the subject gets to her field.?

Same. Plus, I'm virtually allergic to work, and I don't think I'd have the gumption to manage a startup company. If someone else provided the capital and I had all the time in the world to come up with my ideas and find a way to sell them without them being stolen from me, then maybe I could be a successful entrepreneur. Admittedly, most of the ideas I have are for products with a rather narrow market.

What about people with ASD who have an MBA?

Nice to see this perspective published in mainstream media. A rare occasion, common sense from a VC.

Fully concur with the following observations:

1. Competition stifles original thought. I can confirm this with years of first-hand experience. Aspies are great at collaboration, we just do it differently.
2. MBA programs produce thinkers who tend to buy into innovations only once they?ve peaked. Many are harmless, but having MBAs in the wrong places can bring down an entire business.
3. Aspies are unafraid of pursuing ideas seen as strange. Others cave in to peer pressure and impatient investors, and are easily talked out of their so-called "vision".

Tall-P - Thanks for sharing.

Ironically, I first became aware of Peter Thiel when reading through the class notes <click> of a MBA course he taught at Stanford in 2012. LOL.

In any event, I am not surprised by his claim. Peter Thiel is incredibly insightful. He is one of the key thought leaders in Silicon Valley.

I think this is a bit too informal to really take to heart. Some auties are probably really good for a job, regardless of education, but education is extremely important since it provides the knowledge (something nobody is inherently born with) necessary to do a job correctly. I think the best solution would be to have competence exams, and obtaining the highest ranking individuals, and then educate them appropriately to make the best decisions.

But the world doesn't work like that, it's too mechanical and I'm sure there are things that I'm missing that would make such a business more flexible.

I have always felt though that milder forms of ASD are attributed more to a different line of thought rather than an all out bad thing. Thinking in a specialized manner provides results that those who do not think in that sort of way cannot provide - diversity in thought is key to any successful enterprise.

I agree that the lack of fear of pursuing strange or controversial ideas is because of the lack of peer pressure. It is hard to be limited by social norms and conventional ideas when most of us are ( completely ) socially isolated from our local peers. NT do not have issues accepting really weird ideas, as long as there is social pressure to support those weird ideas. Just take a look at religion, NT are capable of doing the most bizarre, ridiculous and downright heinous acts in the name of religion. To me as a person with autism I find the whole notion of religion and the people who mindlessly follow it bizarre. I have never had the social pressure to entice me to buy into it, perhaps that is the only upside of being socially isolated for most of your life. You look at things with a much more neutral view and have much less preconceived views on controversial subjects.

No one is saying that education is counter-productive. The comments made my Peter Thiel need to be seen in context, specifically aimed at MBA-style education. There are many highly educated aspies with PhDs and advanced degrees in disciplines that relate to their specific interests. An MBA education is different in that it teaches a specific established way of looking at the world.

All forms of certification involve some level of standardisation. To a very basic level in most disciplines, and especially in professions where you explicitly want to eliminate people who come up with creative "solutions" (airline pilots, bus drivers, etc.) certification ensures a certain level of minimal acceptable competence.


Correct. There is a reason why there is no fixed curriculum for PhDs and many other higher degrees ? anything of substantive interest and insight is beyond standardisation. There is also a reason why some aspies have a tendency to drop out of formal education if there is too much emphasis on a standard curriculum.

Last edited by jbw on 14 Oct 2014, 2:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Me too! Seems like the story of my life. For example, three suggestions I made at a big box retail store were:
1) Hang a giant flag of Canada, (province) and (city) in the blank wall behind the registers
2) Cross merchandise with the nearby Department store and Electronics store as well as the mall across the street
3) Improve signage throughout the store closer to eye level and make the colours softer. Focus more on (usually shorter) female shoppers because they generally make the family buying decisions NOT men.

All these ideas were literally laughed at by everyone.... then quietly implemented a year later. Cross-merchandising/marketing has since become extremely popular in many Canadian companies. I even designed a "mall of the future" that I would not be surprised came reality down the road although I have never told anyone my idea.

I also once wrote a new company a long email outlining how they could improve their customer experience, atmosphere, etc. What can I say I was bored and underemployed at the time I got back a condescending response that essentially told me they don't need negative people around, to get lost and that nobody else had any complaints but me. They were out of business a few months later. I did this again a few years later by telling a restaurant owner a few things, including the fact that hanging a gigantic "WASHROOM FOR COSTUMER (sp) USE ONLY" and "NO MONEY KEPT ON SITE(sp) sign on the front door pretty much (incorrectly) advertised you were a drug dealers hangout and got a similar response, although he DID implement that change and business appears to have more than doubled based on my observation.

Story of my life that nobody listens to me until it's either too late or almost too late and then steals my idea.

I have both. I think leading a company or one of its departments is not to my taste considering tough real life situations and the resulting stress.

However, having an MBA has had a boost on my career opportunities.

I received an MBA as well, albeit through a part-time, night time program. Without a doubt, I am quite different than the typical MBA graduate.

I know what you mean. What makes it even worse is when you say it and nobody agrees with you that it's a good idea, but when somebody else says it, it's suddenly a great idea.

Me too! Even though here in Hungary the extroverted ideal of managing is not as strong as overseas, which probably has made it a bit easier for me in comparison.

To the aspies with MBA in this thread: Did you go down this educational path because management is one of your special interests, or because you saw it as a way of gaining credentials that help with passing in the neurotypical corporate world?