As someone headed into academia, I ponder how the tenure-track process filters out folks. Simply put, I think many of the best scientists have been nerds, and many smart nerds really don't see the utility in playing the political tenure game. I'd argue that the competition is fiercer now than it's ever been in the sciences, so these selectionary forces against nerd-types are getting stronger.<p>We end up with the situation where scientists in academic jobs are enriched for those good at politics and playing the game, and we lose brilliant minds to companies. Companies also do their part, and offer alluring salaries and job security (I've had quite a few recruitment attempts for wonderful companies, and almost left academia on several occasions).<p>With the folks in academic positions being political (and sometimes downright manipulative), it's no surprise that some make terrible mentors. Their success quite often relies on extracting work from postdocs that will never have their success. Sadly, there's no incentive for symbiotic relationships sometimes. Luckily, finally, I have met mentors that are exceptions to this, and are nerds like me (and quite frankly, keep me in the sciences). But it took a long time to find such mentors, and other very smart people are not so lucky as to find these types of mentors and they leave the sciences. Sadly, this enriches for more bad mentor types. I think the role my mentors' mentors had is huge too; often my mentors talk about how important their mentors were.