
What Separates the Extremely Successful from the Pack? - amahadik
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/04/what_separates_the_extremely_s.html
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nostrademons
All of the data presented here is consistent with the hypothesis of "pure dumb
luck".

You would expect to see more answers like "My wife taught me everything I know
about interpersonal skills" and "I never make an important business decision
without consulting her" from the highly successful group, because they are the
ones who make important business decisions and believe they _have_
interpersonal skills. They get that exterior validation from their outward
success. People who are only moderately successful presumably would be less
comfortable crediting their mediocre success to their wife, so they answer
with the little things that their wife does for them, like cleaning their
shirt.

Similarly, the "propensity for creating value in non-obvious ways" may also
reflect hindsight bias. People tend to get credited for their successes, and
then rise to the level of the organization that their successes merit. Now
imagine that two mid-level managers take identical risks, except that manager
A's risk pans out and manager B's does not. Manager A will be thought of as a
creative, original thinker and get promoted, but manager B will still be
thought of in terms of his other successes, which were probably more ho-hum.
If you look at the top executives, _of course_ they're going to seem like they
create value in creative, original ways, because that was how they got
promoted in the first place.

