THE TRIANGLE OF SUCCESS: NOT WHAT YOU THINK!

THE TRIANGLE OF SUCCESS

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.
© January 2007

“Every one of us is like a man who sees things in a dream and thinks that he knows perfectly and then wakes up to find that he knows nothing.”

Plato, The Statesman

“Thinking does not bring knowledge in the human. Thinking does not produce usable practical wisdom. Thinking does not solve the riddle of the universe. Thinking does not endow us directly with the power to act.”

Martin Heidegger
German philosopher



I was talking to my Beautiful Betty of a Saturday morning about this or that when she mentioned a friend who feels she is making a good living but is not appreciated. BB said, “She is very clever, but she doesn’t always put her best foot forward with others.”

She went on to mention some of the things she has done that were quite clever and innovative, but were not acknowledged. I could not help but think that would never happen to my BB because “Who You Are” (essence) and “What You Are” (personality) are quite in sync with her. As I was thinking this, she added that there was quite a gap between her intelligence and her formal education.

This made me whisper to myself, ah!

“Perhaps,” I suggested, “your friend doesn’t understand the success triangle.” BB smiled, “Of course you expect me to ask now, ‘what is it,’ but I’ll simply let you tell me." So, I did.

THE SUCCESS TRIANGLE

The success triangle has three legs, and all are equally important. Intelligence is one. Education is another. Politics is the third. If any one of these legs is of insufficient length compared to the other two, the chair will tumble and the person on it with it.

INTELLIGENCE

We are all born with intelligence. We have allowed the bureaucrats to limit this to intelligence quotient (IQ), which is the mental age, gleaned from a culturally biased test, divided by the chronological age of the tested person, and times 100.

A person who is ten years old and has a mental age of ten is therefore considered to have an IQ of 100, which is considered average or “normal.”

It is this relationship, up or down, that determines whether we are considered “gifted” or “retarded.” Unfortunately, our whole system for the past century has been relegated to this scale, slotting us accordingly, as if IQ were intelligence personified, which it is not.

Studies have shown, for example, when teachers were told the children (in a sample) were “gifted,” IQ scores rose; when told children were average or below, IQ scores fell by a statistically significant 10 points; 10 points that either bumped the IQ of the individual above or below scores before the study was conducted.

The unfortunate thing about this is children carry the bias of this test score into school and adult life seeing themselves as either “gifted” or “average” or “below average.” What we think we become.

Children are slotted in school and workers in life according to expectations, and such expectations are based, to a large degree, on this synthetic measure. This is consequential because the use of our intelligence is a function of ours and others expectations of us. It translates into if we are not expected to do well we probably won't. In a word, society has created a problem that didn’t previously exist. The solution, the IQ test score, is iatrogenic creating a false positive.

Late in the twentieth century and early in the twenty-first, educators are finding there are many dimensions to intelligence, ranging from academic, practical, social, emotional, to athletic.

EDUCATION

Education in the twentieth century, which continues into the present, is considered the ticket to the good life, and to health, wealth and happiness.

The problem with this is that education is skewed to credentials and to academics, or to the ticket, and not necessarily to the skills. A lot of people fall between the crack between intelligence and education because they have the intelligence for academics but not the opportunity, or they have the intelligence for other pursuits but limited opportunity.

Society is not built on scholars nor on a quantitative college educated population. Society is built on the universal exploitation of human resources in all its hues and cries. Nothing is one dimensional.

Education as a strategy when the focus is on a biased sense of essence (Who You Are) and a limited or predisposed career landscape (What You Are) can produce, and often does, a mismeasured product.

Academic intelligence is likely to be a good fit with the contemplative academically inclined, but not necessarily with the “hands on” person. He is driven by practical action. Some people love to read books as an end in itself; others read books as a means to an end. We need both as worthy pursuits to widen our horizons and perfect those that we have.

Scholars find books as a way to greater scholarship, while people of practical intelligence use book learning to work for them in specific ways. Where the absurd comes in is with athletic intelligence.

Many with supreme athletic intelligence could care less about schoolwork, but find it necessary to go to college, as that is the minor league of professional sport.

Academic students enjoy being spectators to college athletics as a respite from the academic grind. Consequently, college athletes are essentially hired jocks to perform for this audience, with the secondary possibility of earning a degree. If you have had any connection with college athletics, either as a participant or as a tutor, you know of the high jinx and hypocrisy involved.

On the other hand, quite intelligent people can find themselves bereft of sufficient formal education because of circumstances or poor choices in life. They can suffer mightily economically and socially for this shortfall.

Such people can be extremely clever, quite able and willing to learn new things, but since they lack academic credentials, they are slotted to positions often inferior to their ability and potential with little chance of escape.

I'm sure the reader knows of such people. They can be working for a college-trained individual, who gets all the credit, and makes the big bucks, while they do most of the work. Something is wrong with this picture, or is there?

True, some of them find their way into tradecrafts but there is not enough opportunity there, as society has concluded: who wants to be a plumber, pipe fitter, carpenter, electrician or maintenance worker if they can help it? It infers this work doesn't require high level skills, a major contributor, I might add, to our breakdown culture.

Sad to say too many people look down their noses at these very important jobs. That is doubly sad because that is where “Who They Are” would find them most competent, satisfied, and appreciated by being “What They Are.”

They could go into business for themselves, but there is another problem here: they would likely lack the appropriate education in running a business.

Now, they could go to a community college, and develop the appropriate skills, but such training is nonspecific for their purposes. Besides, they would be with college students perhaps half their age. If there is anything we are sensitive about, it is how we look compared to others in a given situation. None of us like to appear vulnerable even when we are.

What budding entrepreneurs need is a step-by-step curriculum designed specifically for them and in a climate that would make them feel comfortable with like minded pursuers. They could then pursue becoming as competent as any CEO running a company.

Much of my adult life has been spent either as an internal or external consultant to major corporations. Since leaving that culture, I have found the same problem exists in small firms in all walks of life.

There are scores of very clever people, people who could do much more than they are now doing, but for the lack of challenging and appropriate education.

Notice I say “education,” and not “skills training.” These are people that are quasi-professionals, often called technicians that have had no college, little college, and possibly, not even a high school diploma. They were born with high intelligence (Who They Are) that has been blunted by circumstances, poor choices, or aided and abetted by a warped personality (What They Are). Consequently, few realize their potential because “What They Are” blinds them from the prospect of using “Who They Are.” This is where politics enters.

POLITICS

We have this comfort level that we elect politicians to do our bidding, criticize them when they fall short of the mark, and feel no guilt for being completely oblivious to the fact that we are all politicians, every last one of us.

We are politicians every waking moment of our lives. Politicians are influence peddlers. That is what politics is: influencing others. We are all selling our influence or placing barriers to it by the way we think, feel, act and behave.

Influence is one of those counter intuitive dimensions of personality or “What We Are.” Let us say, for argument's sake, you have a “genius” IQ, and you go around demonstrating to others how much “smarter” you are than they are. You will find the more you demonstrate this propensity the less influence you have until you have none. Should that happen, people would likely delight in seeing you fail. They may actually do something to make it happen.

Let us say you are a brilliant engineer and you punish colleagues and people outside the discipline with your brilliance, again your influence will be nil and you will become a pariah among your own ranks. Unfortunately, it is likely you will be the last person to understand that is the reason you are not making satisfactory progress in your career.

So, when you peddle your influence, you lose it. When you allow others to recognize it in you, and are modest about it, you gain it.

Influence or the lack of influence doesn’t stop there. Let us return to the thinking, feeling, acting, and behaving.

Again, for argument's sake, imagine you hate your job, hate what you are doing, feel it is demeaning, but do it mechanically and robotically to get it done, and behave as if your dentist is extracting your teeth all the while.

What amazes me about people that operate like this, and I have known legions, is that they are always surprised when the ax falls, when they are demoted, made redundant, or fired. We conveniently put this under the broad umbrella of “they have a bad attitude,” but that doesn’t even start to cover it.

Attitude is simply the predisposition to act in a certain way. All the poisons in our minds collect to wreck our will as surely as cancer cells can wreck our bodies. Others sense how we feel without saying a word. When our will is not working for us, it is working against us. The will is never inactive.

A person close to me has been literally dying for twenty years with so many physical complications you would have thought she would have died long ago. But her will is strong, just as strong as it ever was. Some scoff at the idea of “being reborn” as she was more than fifty years ago in her Christian faith, but I see it as something that has supported that will and carried her in harmony with it ever since. Yes, she will die one day as we all do, but she has demonstrated to me the power of will.

HOW DESIRE CAN STEER US IN THE WRONG DIRECTION

Ideally, the way the three legs of triangle can support us is to take our cleverness, our intelligence, and reduce the gap between intelligence and education. Notice I am not speaking of education in the formal book learning, schoolroom sense necessarily, but as a friend insists on lifelong learning.

There is no reason we should not be able to get this on the job if we come into the working environment inappropriately skilled. It does happen to many, but not to everyone because of their personality (What They Are). As I’ve indicated, we can make it a problem for ourselves, but sometimes the system is a barrier difficult to penetrate.

Imagine you want to get ahead in an organization and all the others have college degrees and you do not, but you are as intelligent as any of them, possibly more so. Is this going to work for or against you?

If you try to see how the political landscape lies, and attempt to back the “right horses,” you could develop a gulf between yourself and the herd. If the gamble is right, there is a good chance you’ll get the skills training you need and you’ll find yourself making progress. If wrong, you will never have an even chance in this environment. History will follow anf foil you.

Now, if you see how the political landscape lies, and choose instead to treat everyone with respect, never talk out of turn about anyone, and always give your best, it is another matter. You will be demonstrating your capacity to learn and ability to problem solve, which will enhance your reputation. Not everyone necessarily will like you, but the wind will be at your back and “Who You Are” will make “What You Are” more a possibility.

I have witnessed both scenarios many times, as I’m sure the reader has as well.

WHAT IT ALL MEANS

We are all imperfect beings but perfectible. We need help in that perfection. We are blessed with intelligence, we develop a personality, and can come to realize our influence if “Who We Are” and “What We Are” come into some balance.

Some of us do this with relative ease; most of us do not. That is why the help is so vital. But to get that help we must first help ourselves, and again, many of us fail to do that.

It is a matter of stubbornness, not believing we need it, but probably more a case of not knowing ourselves. Self-ignorance is something our culture unwittingly encourages as it reifies artificial indicators, which can prevent rather than accommodate us from realizing our potential.

It is the reliance on artificial constructs or indices that has become an institutional problem at all levels: family, school, church, industry, commerce, and government. Society wants so desperately to place us all in convenient boxes or stereotypes.

It sometimes appears as if we are a society that doesn’t have a clue as to “Who We Are” and therefore “What We Are” keeps getting in our way, domestically and internationally.

I’m not supposed to make those quantum leaps from the individual to society, for it isn’t considered good scholarship, good reasoning, and certainly not reinforcing semantics, but I do it all the time, as readers can attest.

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