Top performers’ success may have more to do with great timing than great talent, writes Chengwei Liu.By Chengwei Liu, University of WarwickFromThe Conversation22 September 2017Bill Gates is a lot luckier than you might realise. He may be a very talented man who worked his way up from college dropout to the top spot on the list of the world’s richest people. But his extreme success perhaps tells us more about the importance of circumstances beyond his control than it does about how skill and perseverance are rewarded.We often fall for the idea that the exceptional performers are the most skilled or talentedWe often fall for the idea that the exceptional performers are the most skilled or talented. But this is flawed. Exceptional performances tend to occur in exceptional circumstances. Top performers are often the luckiest people, who have benefited from being at the right place and right time. They are what we calloutliers, whose performances maybe examples set apart from the system that everyone else works within.Many treat Gates, and other highly successful people like him, as deserving of huge attention and reward, as people from whom we could learn a lot about how to succeed. But assuming life’s “winners” got there from performance alone is likely to lead to disappointment. Even if you could imitate everything Gatesdid, you would not be able to replicate his initial good fortune.For example, Gates’s upper-class background and private education enabled him to gain extra programming experience when less than 0.01% of his generation then had access to computers.His mother’s social connection with IBM’schairman enabled him to gain a contract from the then-leading PC company that was crucial for establishing his software empire.Top performers are often the luckiest people, who have benefited from being at the right place and right timeThis is important because most customers who used IBM computers wereforced to learn how to use Microsoft’s software that came along with it. This created an inertia in Microsoft’s favour. The next software these customers chosewas more likely to be Microsoft’s, not because their software was necessarily the best, but because most people were too busy to learn how to use anything else.Microsoft’s success and market share may differ from the rest by several orders of magnitude but the difference was reallyenabled by Gate’s early fortune, reinforcedby a strong success-breeds-success dynamic. Of course, Gates’s talent and effort played important roles in the extreme success of Microsoft. But that’s not enough for creating such an outlier. Talent and effort are likely to be less important than circumstances in the sense that he could not have been so successful without the latter.A magic number?One might argue that many exceptional performers still gained their exceptional skill through hard work, exceptional motivation or “grit”, so they do not deserve to receive lower reward and praise. Some have even suggested that there is a magic number for greatness, a ten-year or10,000-hour rule. Many professionals and experts did acquire their exceptional skill through persistent, deliberate practices. In fact, Gates’ 10,000hours learning computer programming asa teenager has been highlighted as one ofthe reasons for his success.But detailed analyses of the case studies of experts often suggest that certain situational factors beyond the control of these exceptional performers also play animportant role. For example, three national champions in table tennis came from the same street in a small suburb of one town in England.10,000 hoursThe “10,000 hours of practice” rule is based on research by psychologist Anders Ericsson, which was popularised by US author Malcolm Gladwell in his 2008 book Outliers.This wasn’t a coincidence or because there was nothing else to do but practise ping pong. It turns out that a famous tabletennis coach, Peter Charters, happened to retire in this particular suburb. Many kids who lived on the same street as the retired coach were attracted to this sport because of him and three of them, after following the “10,000-hour rule”, performed exceptionally well, including winning the national championship.Their talent and efforts were, of course, essential for realising their exceptional performances. But without their early luck(having a reliable, high-quality coach and supportive families), simply practicing 10,000 hours without adequate feedback wouldn’t likely lead a randomly picked child to become a national champion.We could also imagine a child with superior talent in table tennis suffering from early bad luck, such as not having a capable coach or being in a country where being an athlete was not considered to be a promising career. Thenthey might never have a chance to realise their potential. The implication is that the more exceptional a performance is, the fewer meaningful, applicable lessons we can actually learn from the “winner”.Being in the right place at the right timecan be so important that it overwhelmsmeritsWhen it comes to moderate performance, it seems much more likely that our intuition about success is correct. Conventional wisdom, such as “the harderI work the luckier I get” or “chance favoursthe prepared mind”, makes perfect sense when talking about someone moving from poor to good performance. Going from good to great, however, is a different story.Being in the right place (succeeding in a context where early outcome has an enduring impact) at the right time (having early luck) can be so important that it overwhelms merits. With this in mind there’s a good case that we shouldn’t justreward or imitate life’s winners and expect to have similar success. But there is a case that the winners should considerimitating the likes of Gates (who became a philanthropist) or Warren Buffett (who argues that richer Americans should pay higher taxes) who have chosen to use their wealth and success to do good things. The winners who appreciate their luck and do not take it all deserve more of our respect.Chengwei Liu is an associate professor of strategy and behavioural science at the Warwick Business School, University of Warwick. This article was originally published atThe Conversationand has been republished under Creative Commons.

Top performers are the luckiest people who may have benefitted from being at the right place at the right time.

This comment is true as well as the summary of your write up.

But understand that these performers also put in effort, built a culture of being open minded and focused on their purpose. Ready and waiting for opportunity.

I will say that a combination of DREAMS, FOCUS, ACTION and TIME are the ingredients for success.

Anyone can be successful applying the same ingredients..

Mind you, Nigeria has lost more than 90% of its usual opportunities for success..

Nigeria used to be a land of opportunities, now you would need God , Timing and Luck to hit the jackpot..

Like this

bigpicture001:
Top performers’ success may have more to do with great timing than great talent, writes Chengwei Liu.By Chengwei Liu, University of WarwickFromThe Conversation22 September 2017Bill Gates is a lot luckier than you might realise. He may be a very talented man who worked his way up from college dropout to the top spot on the list of the world’s richest people. But his extreme success perhaps tells us more about the importance of circumstances beyond his control than it does about how skill and perseverance are rewarded.We often fall for the idea that the exceptional performers are the most skilled or talentedWe often fall for the idea that the exceptional performers are the most skilled or talented. But this is flawed. Exceptional performances tend to occur in exceptional circumstances. Top performers are often the luckiest people, who have benefited from being at the right place and right time. They are what we calloutliers, whose performances maybe examples set apart from the system that everyone else works within.Many treat Gates, and other highly successful people like him, as deserving of huge attention and reward, as people from whom we could learn a lot about how to succeed. But assuming life’s “winners” got there from performance alone is likely to lead to disappointment. Even if you could imitate everything Gatesdid, you would not be able to replicate his initial good fortune.For example, Gates’s upper-class background and private education enabled him to gain extra programming experience when less than 0.01% of his generation then had access to computers.His mother’s social connection with IBM’schairman enabled him to gain a contract from the then-leading PC company that was crucial for establishing his software empire.Top performers are often the luckiest people, who have benefited from being at the right place and right timeThis is important because most customers who used IBM computers wereforced to learn how to use Microsoft’s software that came along with it. This created an inertia in Microsoft’s favour. The next software these customers chosewas more likely to be Microsoft’s, not because their software was necessarily the best, but because most people were too busy to learn how to use anything else.Microsoft’s success and market share may differ from the rest by several orders of magnitude but the difference was reallyenabled by Gate’s early fortune, reinforcedby a strong success-breeds-success dynamic. Of course, Gates’s talent and effort played important roles in the extreme success of Microsoft. But that’s not enough for creating such an outlier. Talent and effort are likely to be less important than circumstances in the sense that he could not have been so successful without the latter.A magic number?One might argue that many exceptional performers still gained their exceptional skill through hard work, exceptional motivation or “grit”, so they do not deserve to receive lower reward and praise. Some have even suggested that there is a magic number for greatness, a ten-year or10,000-hour rule. Many professionals and experts did acquire their exceptional skill through persistent, deliberate practices. In fact, Gates’ 10,000hours learning computer programming asa teenager has been highlighted as one ofthe reasons for his success.But detailed analyses of the case studies of experts often suggest that certain situational factors beyond the control of these exceptional performers also play animportant role. For example, three national champions in table tennis came from the same street in a small suburb of one town in England.10,000 hoursThe “10,000 hours of practice” rule is based on research by psychologist Anders Ericsson, which was popularised by US author Malcolm Gladwell in his 2008 book Outliers.This wasn’t a coincidence or because there was nothing else to do but practise ping pong. It turns out that a famous tabletennis coach, Peter Charters, happened to retire in this particular suburb. Many kids who lived on the same street as the retired coach were attracted to this sport because of him and three of them, after following the “10,000-hour rule”, performed exceptionally well, including winning the national championship.Their talent and efforts were, of course, essential for realising their exceptional performances. But without their early luck(having a reliable, high-quality coach and supportive families), simply practicing 10,000 hours without adequate feedback wouldn’t likely lead a randomly picked child to become a national champion.We could also imagine a child with superior talent in table tennis suffering from early bad luck, such as not having a capable coach or being in a country where being an athlete was not considered to be a promising career. Thenthey might never have a chance to realise their potential. The implication is that the more exceptional a performance is, the fewer meaningful, applicable lessons we can actually learn from the “winner”.Being in the right place at the right timecan be so important that it overwhelmsmeritsWhen it comes to moderate performance, it seems much more likely that our intuition about success is correct. Conventional wisdom, such as “the harderI work the luckier I get” or “chance favoursthe prepared mind”, makes perfect sense when talking about someone moving from poor to good performance. Going from good to great, however, is a different story.Being in the right place (succeeding in a context where early outcome has an enduring impact) at the right time (having early luck) can be so important that it overwhelms merits. With this in mind there’s a good case that we shouldn’t justreward or imitate life’s winners and expect to have similar success. But there is a case that the winners should considerimitating the likes of Gates (who became a philanthropist) or Warren Buffett (who argues that richer Americans should pay higher taxes) who have chosen to use their wealth and success to do good things. The winners who appreciate their luck and do not take it all deserve more of our respect.Chengwei Liu is an associate professor of strategy and behavioural science at the Warwick Business School, University of Warwick. This article was originally published atThe Conversationand has been republished under Creative Commons.

Thank You so much Op