This is an important question that has been a focus of the human resources departments of high tech companies in recent decades. In 1993, Forbes journalist Richard Karlgaard, in a conversation with Bill Gates asked, “What Microsoft competitor worries you most?” Without hesitation, Gates responded, “Goldman Sachs.” When Karlgaard responded with surprise that Gates named an investment banking company rather than a computer company, Gates clarified:
Software is an IQ business. Microsoft must win the IQ war, or we won’t have a future. I don’t worry about Lotus or IBM, because the smartest guys would rather come to work for Microsoft. Our competitors for IQ are investment banks such as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.
The human resources people at Microsoft and other companies designed questions to determine the intelligence and the creativity of applicants for jobs in their organizations. One of the questions they asked was, “Why are manhole covers round instead of square?”
Answer: A round cover has the same diameter throughout and the hole it covers has a smaller diameter, so the cover can never fall through the hole, even if it’s picked up and rotated. However the diagonal of a square hole is greater than the edge of its cover, so the cover could fall through the hole.
They would watch the applicant’s thought processes as they analyzed the problem and verbalized their problem-solving process. The paragraphs below, present a few other problems of the same type:
Question 2: It is given that everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people. Deepti is prejudiced against Jill. Is Jill prejudiced against Jamal? (See answer: https://www.intelligence-and-iq.com/is-jill-prejudiced-against-jamal/)
Question 3: A gambler makes an “even money” bet on each toss of a coin. The amount he bets is half the amount of money he has in his possession. On a sequence of 10 bets, he wins 5 Times. Does the gambler have more, less or the same amount that he had at the beginning? (See answer: https://www.intelligence-and-iq.com/does-he-win-or-lose/)
A variety of similar questions can be found on that site. The answers to such questions is not as important to the interviewer as the logical process that the applicant pursues in moving toward the answer. The people whom I have judged to be most intelligent usually display what I will call a “rational habit of mind.” Such people are open to a discussion on most issues and they hold their opinions in abeyance, always seeking to learn more as they hone their insights Such people can be approached on virtually any issue and they respond cheerfully and rationally even when challenged. To me, that signals high intelligence and wisdom.
