UPSC Mains 2018 GS Paper 4 Q3b: model answer
"In looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities : integrity, intelligence and energy. And if they do not have the first, the other two will kill you." — Warren Buffett What do you understand by this statement in the present-day scenario ? Explain.
What the question wants
Explain Buffett's view that integrity must come before intelligence and energy when hiring, in today's context.
How to structure it
Meaning, why integrity first, examples, public service.
- Meaning
- Why the other two become dangerous
- Examples
- Application
How to think it through
Intelligence + energy without integrity = efficient wrongdoing; scale of damage. Examples: FTX collapse 2022 (Sam Bankman-Fried, convicted 2023, 25-year sentence 2024); Satyam; Nirav Modi PNB fraud 2018 (~₹13,000 crore). Present: background checks, ethics paper in UPSC since 2013, integrity column APAR. Public service: discretion over public money.
Model answer
Warren Buffett has hired managers for decades. His rule is simple: a dishonest person who is also clever and hard-working is not a weak hire; he is a dangerous one.
What it means
- Intelligence decides how well a person can do things; energy decides how much.
- Integrity decides for whom they do them: the organisation, or themselves.
- Without integrity, the other two only make wrongdoing faster and larger.
In the present-day scenario
- FTX (2022): a young, brilliant founder ran a crypto exchange that collapsed after customer money was secretly misused; Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in 2024.
- PNB fraud (2018): letters of undertaking worth about ₹13,000 crore were issued through misuse of banking systems.
Why it matters in hiring today
- Digital systems give single employees access to huge sums and data.
For public service
- UPSC added a full ethics paper in 2013; the APAR has an integrity column.
- An officer controls public money and power; a clever but corrupt officer harms more people than an honest, average one.
Hire for character; skills can be trained, but character rarely can.
Draw: A multiplication: intelligence × energy × integrity; if integrity is negative, the product is negative and large.
Keywords, cases and data to drop in
Warren Buffett, integrity, intelligence, energy, FTX 2022, Sam Bankman-Fried 25 years, PNB fraud 2018, scale of damage, UPSC ethics paper 2013, APAR integrity column.
Where most answers lose marks
- Treating the three qualities as equal; the point is that integrity is a precondition.
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Fresh examples from current affairs
Supreme Court: no prior approval under Section 17A needed to probe a bribe demand
In a judgment of 16 October 2026, a Supreme Court Bench of Justices S.V.N. Bhatti and N.V. Anjaria held that investigating a bribe demand by a public servant does not need prior approval under Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Asking for a bribe, the court said, is not part of discharging official duties.
UPSC angle: Prelims: Sections 7, 7A, 17A and 19 of the PC Act. · Mains GS-II/GS-IV: honest officers versus accountability.
19 Oct 2026Learn the concept
Question text as printed in the official UPSC Civil Services (Main) question paper. The model answer is original Battle IAS work; use it to learn structure, not to memorise.
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