Values like efficiency and elegance are mediated and determined by the community and the subjective individual. They're neither unambiguous nor universally agreed upon. Even on the very simple, immediate level - is elegance more like readability or concision? Is efficiency a matter of performance or maintainability? Now expand your view to encompass all the problems and questions that come up in the course of your job—the majority of them, as noted above, having more to do with other people than writing better code.

Being better at your job isn't simply a matter of advancing along the numberline of skill and smarts. And unfortunately, many of those who think it clearly is, or can be, are assholes who are lousy at working with others.