Incentives to be Smart

This morning on CNN, Lloyd Blankfein, CEO and Chairman of Goldman Sachs, commented (approximately): "You can incentivize someone to move from one part of the room to another ... but you can't incentivize someone to be smart." Although I know this isn't what he meant (he went on the say that the problem was with the dumb "risk managers"), if we can't incentivize people to be smart, what's the point of Mr. Blankfein earning $53.4 million in 2006?

Mr. Blankfein has been on a charm offensive recently and Goldman Sachs earnings did fall short of setting a record this quarter, but I'm not sure the charm offensive is helping his case.