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Incompetent friends

Am I a jerk to think that it’s hard – and maybe impossible – to have an incompetent friend?

If you know for a fact that your friend is terrible at their job, even if their job has nothing to do with your job, does that make it hard to continue to be their friend?

As I run through the list of my current and even former friends, I’m hard-pressed to find an incompetent one in the bunch. A few from the past come to mind, but I must also admit that I was the one who created the distance that ultimately ended the friendship.

But as I scan the horizon today, almost all of my friends are highly successful people in their particular professions. Some are more skillful and successful than others, of course, but I can’t think of anyone who isn’t at the top or near the top of their game.

I take note of this because I have a friend who has an incompetent friend. Even worse, they both do the same job. My friend performs that job exceedingly well, but the other is objectively terrible at the same job, and my friend knows it.

I don’t know how you continue being friends with someone like that.

But perhaps I’m a jerk.