Three Paths to Success
Consider that there are only three paths to outstanding professional success, where “outstanding” means obtaining leadership positions, abnormal financial compensation, industry-appropriate recognition, etc.
The first path is “Have Friends”. This abbreviated term will be used to generally describe the modus operandi of someone who is a people person, whom people like, who fosters friendships easily, who has charm or is attractive.
The second path is “Break Rules”. This path consists of any combination of lying/cheating/stealing, exploiting the system, backstabbing and underhandedness, possible criminality, etc. It works on the principle that in systems where rules are followed, breaking them can result in above-average success.
The third path is “Be Excellent”. Here, it’s a matter of concrete skill, knowledge, execution, delivery, or otherwise being perceived as truly being superior in qualities to other people operating in the same domain. The excellence has to be sufficiently high for people to recognise and regularly say “wow, that person is amazing at X”.
Most people that achieve outstanding professional success take only one of these paths. Consider current famous politicians (NB: it is particularly easy to segment politicians because their professional success in politics is based on getting us to know them; conversely, for example, military leaders intentionally maintain obscure personas and opinions and are thus less easy for the public to segment, though rest assured, inside the military promotion system the same paths to success apply).
Donald Trump took the “Break Rules” path to success. He has basically no “friends”, only transactional relationships, and, very clearly, he is not a stable genius.
Barrack Obama took the “Be Excellent” path to success. He was very smart and polished, thoughtful and considered, excelled in his education and career. But he’s not a “lot’s of friends” guy, and he’s certainly not a rule breaker.
Joe Biden — very clearly a “Have Friends” guy. He’s not a genius, and certainly not a rule breaker. Also, George W. Bush — a minor rule breaker, true, but his path to success was primarily thanks to his friendly nature and his giant circle of friends and family.
Hilary Clinton — “Be Excellent”. Besides her email servers, she’s a rule follower, not a rule breaker, and isn’t a “friendly” person either.
Vladimir Putin — “Break Rules” all the way. He has no friends, and a very undistinguished academic and pre-dictatorial career. He just took power the old fashioned way. The same can be said for a particular class of current leaders — Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, Recep Erdogan of Turkey, Viktor Orban of Hungary. Men of moderate intellect and little charm, but with great rule-breaking capabilities and drive.
We can also consider some better-known business leaders.
Steve Jobs — “Be Excellent”. He was generally considered a jerk. Though he seemed to break the rules along the way, he actually really didn’t. He just did really innovative product and business strategy (which was his excellence).
Bill Gates — “Be Excellent”. Perhaps many honest introverts who are not cut out for the first two paths go into tech precisely because it’s an easier industry to take the path of Being Excellent.
On the other hand, perhaps a lot of those who prefer the path of Break Rules go into finance for the exact same reason — it’s easier to re-appropriate someone else’s money from existing financial flows than it is to create new value. Bernie Madoff of the pyramid scheme, Kenneth Lay of Enron, the entire Trump family (casinos and real estate (and the related tax exploits) are primarily finance industries, not value creation ones).
Elon Musk — He positions himself as Being Excellent, but he’s no more excellent or genius than many other engineers. The dominant path he follows now is Break Rules (for example, the rules of debt financing of Tesla, or making his employees work during COVID, or how many hours of sleep a healthy body needs).
Richard Branson — everybody loves the guy; he enjoys and profits from Having Friends.
Now, there are people that succeed down two of three paths, but they are very rare. This makes them unique and interesting (though not necessarily worthy of emulation).
Bill Clinton — very strong “Have Friends” guy. Everybody that met him loved him. And, very clearly, a “Be Excellent” guy. His work ethic, his smarts, his analysis, his academic performance, etc. were always a head above everyone else.
Boris Johnson — by nature, a very strong “Have Friends” guy with lots of charm and an attractive personality. But, very early on, he also started developing his “Break Rules” skills, which he rode all the way to the Prime Ministership of Britain.
Are there people that take all three paths? Possibly, one in a billion. They are definitely worthy of study! Typically, they end up being infamous strongmen.
Vladimir Lenin — people seemed to love him, and he was early on regarded as charming (at least women got along with him well). He did break a ton of rules (including starting a whole revolution — you can’t get any more rule-breaking than that), and by all accounts, he was very smart and capable of speaking, strategising, organising, etc.
Mao Zedong — same as Lenin!
Fidel Castro — Same as Lenin and Mao! Probably even more so.
But, sometimes, they find other forms of outstanding success besides in revolutionary dictatorship. Perhaps in science: Albert Einstein — a genius beloved by all.
Rock and roll and art also seem to attract the rare triple-pathers — the beloved genius rogues — Elvis Presley, Andy Warhol, George Michael, Amy Winehouse. Although if they get too far down the “Break Rules” path, their outstanding success gets derailed by public opinion or prison (Michael Jackson, Harvey Weinstein).
If you think of people in your own professional career, you can probably identify which path the leaders and executives you have known have taken.
As for yourself, if you want to have outstanding professional success, you should identify which path you will take. But, consider that if you are not naturally a “Have Friends” person, you will probably not be able to stay on that path consistently enough and with enough energy to get to success. Consider that the “Break Rules” path is not for everyone and requires a large degree of immorality or sociopathy — you’ll likely hurt many people along the way. Consider that “Be Excellent” path actually requires you to be excellent, so make sure you chose a field or pursuit which aligns with where you are truly excellent.
If you don’t want or can’t take any of these three paths, be content with moderate success. Which is OK too, that’s what most people achieve.
