Sherry Cooper’s formula for success

Sherry Cooper (@DrSherryCooper) is TMX professor of financial economics at the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University and former chief economist and executive vice-president at Bank of Montreal.

The key attributes of successful people are remarkably similar, regardless of their choice of fields. I am often asked by young people and their parents where the best opportunities are, as though success were determined by economic factors – the pursuit of a career in a growth sector. Instead, I believe that potential lies within the individual and is determined by a set of attributes and behaviours that can be applied to any field. Here is a list of the eight indispensable characteristics of successful people:

1. Passion is essential. Doing what you love is key to any successful endeavour. If you do what makes your heart sing, chances are you will be good at it. What’s more, passion is contagious and energizes those around you. Follow your dreams and dream big. Anything else is a cop-out, and forget about the money. If you follow your dreams, the money will come. 

2. Energy is closely linked to passion. Doing something you love gives you the energy required to achieve your goals. It takes hard work – very hard work – to shine in today’s complex and volatile world. The willingness to put in the 10,000 hours required to master a skill, any skill, is essential. That includes the ability to write, speak, engage and motivate – all essential to reach your full potential. 

3. Perseverance is the difference between mediocrity and success. No one achieves anything meaningful without hitting roadblocks, experiencing failures and overcoming adversity. Indeed, these disappointments and difficulties hone your skills and redirect your energies. All failures must be seen as opportunities to reroute and reinvent. That is a winner’s mentality. Never give up and never let naysayers defeat you. Unfortunately, there will always be people who question your judgment and criticize your decisions. You can listen, but let it roll off you. Believe in yourself. 

4 . A willingness to surround yourself with positive people who make you feel good, and dispose of destructive and dysfunctional relationships. That includes bad work relationships. If your boss is unsupportive and demeaning, get out. You will never succeed under such a negative force. 

5. Focus is essential. It is what psychologists call being in the flow. Any real achievement requires hours of uninterrupted concentration, which is increasingly difficult with the constant bombardment of e-mail. Anything worth doing is worth doing singlemindedly, which is the antithesis of today’s multitasking ethos. 

6. Efficacy – the power or capacity to produce a desired effect – is crucial to your well-being. Take ownership of your power. You determine your destiny, not your biography. Regardless of your circumstances, you and you alone can make things happen. The defining factor in success is not resources, but resourcefulness. Passivity is the antithesis of resourcefulness. 

7. The determination to push yourself. Take the stretch assignment or, as Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg says, Lean In. Move outside your comfort zone; it is the only way to learn, and lifelong learning is crucial. The body of knowledge is growing so rapidly that anyone wishing to succeed must keep reading, adapting and learning new skills. 

8. Innovation. Creativity is the essence of meeting competitive pressures. Anyone who remains the same is falling behind as the pace of change is relentless. As Charles Darwin said: “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.” Yet most of us do not like change, which lets those who embrace change stand out and rise to the top.

Game changers: Five opportunities for US growth and renewal

by: Susan Lund, James Manyika, Scott Nyquist, Lenny Mendonca, and Sreenivas Ramaswamy

The US economy is struggling to find a new formula for vigorous growth. But all growth opportunities are not created equal. New McKinsey research pinpoints five catalysts—in energy, trade, technology, infrastructure, and talent development—that can quickly create jobs and deliver a substantial boost to GDP by 2020.

 

 

Four years after the official end of the Great Recession, US economic growth remains lackluster. But there is more at work here than simply the business cycle: strains in the labor market were apparent long before 2008. Today, labor-force participation is at a 34-year low, and the United States has two million fewer jobs than it did when the recession began. Weak investment, demographic shifts, and a slowdown in productivity growth are dampening the economy’s trajectory.

But the United States does not have to resign itself to sluggish growth. Game changers: Five opportunities for US growth and renewal, a new report from the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), identifies specific catalysts that can add hundreds of billions of dollars to annual GDP and create millions of new jobs by 2020.

To identify these catalysts, MGI looked for developments that are poised to achieve scale immediately and could accelerate growth across multiple sectors by 2020. We also focused on areas with an immediate window for action. 

Game changers zeroes in on five mutually reinforcing opportunities:

• Shale-gas and -oil production. Powered by advances in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, the production of domestic shale gas and oil has grown more than 50 percent annually since 2007. The shale boom could add as much as $690 billion a year to GDP and create up to 1.7 million jobs across the economy by 2020. The impact will extend to energy-intensive manufacturing industries and beyond. The United States now has the potential to reduce net energy imports to zero—but only if it can successfully address the associated environmental risks.  
• US trade competitiveness in knowledge-intensive goods. The United States is one of the few advanced economies running a trade deficit in knowledge-intensive industries. But changing factor costs, a rebound in demand, and currency shifts are creating an opening to increase US production and exports of knowledge-intensive goods, such as automobiles, commercial airliners, medical devices, and petrochemicals. By implementing five strategies to boost competitiveness in these sectors, we believe the United States could reduce the trade deficit in knowledge-intensive industries to its 2000 level or close it—which would add up to $590 billion in annual GDP by 2020 and create up to 1.8 million new jobs.
• Big-data analytics as a productivity tool. Sectors across the economy can harness the deluge of data generated by transactions, medical and legal records, videos, and social technologies—not to mention the sensors, cameras, bar codes, and transmitters embedded in the world around us. Advances in computing and analytics can transform this sea of data into insights that create operational efficiencies. By 2020, the wider adoption of big-data analytics could increase annual GDP in retailing and manufacturing by up to $325 billion and save as much as $285 billion in the cost of health care and government services.
• Increased investment in infrastructure, with a new emphasis on productivity. The backlog of maintenance and upgrades for US roads, highways, bridges, and transit and water systems is reaching critical levels. The United States must increase its annual infrastructure investment by one percentage point of GDP to erase this competitive disadvantage. By 2020, that could create up to 1.8 million jobs and boost annual GDP by up to $320 billion. The impact could grow to $600 billion annually by 2030 if the selection, delivery, and operation of infrastructure investments improve.
• A more effective US system of talent development. The nation’s long-standing advantage in education and skills has been eroding, but today real improvements are within reach. At the postsecondary level, expanding industry-specific training and increasing the number of graduates in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math could build a more competitive workforce. At the K–12 level, enhancing classroom instruction, turning around underperforming high schools, and introducing digital learning tools can boost student achievement. These initiatives could raise GDP by as much as $265 billion by 2020—and achieve a dramatic “liftoff” effect by 2030, adding as much as $1.7 trillion to annual GDP.

These opportunities can have immediate demand-stimulus effects that would get the economy moving again in the short term and also have longer-term effects that would build US competitiveness and productivity well beyond 2020. Taking action now could mark a turning point for the US economy and drive growth and prosperity for decades to come.

About the authors

Susan Lund is a principal at the McKinsey Global Institute, where James Manyika is a director; Scott Nyquist is a director in McKinsey’s Houston office; Lenny Mendonca is a director in the Washington, DC, office.

Secrets to Lasting Success as an Entrepreneur

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Successful people will often tell you that luck and hard work got them where they are. But under the surface, there's much more going on. People who rise to top of their fields have a lot in common. Learning what sets them apart can help you find lasting success in your own business.

Jeff Brown, a Harvard Medical School faculty psychologist and co-author of The Winner's Brain (DaCapo, 2010), studies highly successful people, looking at their brain activity and life stories for clues to what makes them unique.

Turns out, they think differently than those whose success peters out or never comes to pass. "People who are successful have learned to optimize their brains," Brown says.

He's uncovered strategies, which he calls "brain power tools," that successful people use to achieve their goals. Each tool is a way of thinking that affects your choices and actions as you work toward a goal. Taken together, they help you find opportunities, build mastery, work through failures and surpass the status quo.

Consider Brown's five keys to lasting success as outlined below. Give these tactics a try to reach your goals time and time again.

1. Create your own serendipity.

If you look at highly successful people, their road to greatness was full of twists and turns.

"Successful people take very circuitous paths," Brown says. "They have a real knack for recognizing nontraditional opportunities."

Rather than waiting in a long line of succession, look for paths that others haven't tried. Take on projects that add a unique skill to your toolkit, find ways to meet people you admire, or pitch yourself for opportunities that seem like an unexpected match. Don't be afraid to get creative. There are many ways to reach every destination.

2. Know what you bring to the table.

Successful people take inventory of their skills and abilities regularly, and they use that feedback to improve. "If they have a deficit, they want to know it," Brown says.

Ask mentors and coaches to assess your strengths and weaknesses, and measure your skills objectively if you can. Use that information to identify what to learn or practice so that you master strengths and bolster weak skills. And don't shy away from criticism out of fear or pride, Brown says. "That's the kiss of death when it comes to success."

3. Focus on a single end goal.

The ability to choose a goal and work toward it without getting distracted is a trademark among highly successful people. "They have laser focus, which boosts their ability to think and execute," Brown says.

Create a list of priorities and use them to select which opportunities to pursue. "Don't be duped by the illusion of missed opportunity where you think you have to do everything that comes your way," Brown says. "Lock onto your goal and don't get distracted."

4. Work at the edge of your comfort zone.

Risk is necessary if you want to truly excel, and successful people approach risk with a clear sense of how much they can handle. "They take moderate risks," Brown says. "They're out of their comfort zone but not going crazy."

Test your own boundaries by looking for risks that make you slightly uncomfortable but still more excited than anxious. "You have an optimal risk range that you have to learn to gauge and understand," Brown says. The more you experiment with taking risks, big and small, the easier it will be to find your sweet spot in the future.

5. Put your energy into the daily grind.

Successful people work tirelessly toward their goals. They're propelled by an internal energy that keeps them moving forward, even when they face setbacks or success seems far away. "They keep giving to the process and keep investing," Brown says. Their drive isn't pushy or demanding. It's persistent.

Rather than always looking ahead at the end goal, immerse yourself in the daily practice of building toward it. Learning to enjoy and embrace that process will help you develop the stamina and resilience you need to see it through. "You should enjoy the pursuit of success," Brown says. "The chase lasts much longer than the catch."

BY Nadia Goodman