If You're So Smart, Why Aren't You Rich?

Years ago I ran an ad with this headline in the Mensa Journal. Mensa is the High IQ organization for people ranking in the top 2% of the population. The ad went on to explain that I was looking for top level engineering analysts. Many people responded and I interviewed at least ten of them.

What a disappointment! Not one of these people was even marginally adequate for the job. Their employment histories were a series of disasters. The only thing these people had going for them was that they were very smart. But they were failures at almost everything they had tried. Oh yes, they had one other commonality, besides being smart. They had the best excuses for their failures that I had ever heard.

Set me to thinking.....why were these super intelligent people such dismal failures? After talking to a handful of them it became obvious. None of them had the slightest idea how to really work! All of them had breezed through school without effort. They didn't have to study to pass the exams. They didn't have to apply themselves to get good grades or awards. They were so intelligent that they could get by without effort, so they never learned to put their backs into anything. They all seemed to feel that their superior intelligence entitled them to privileged treatment. They expected their effortless success in school to continue in the working world.

That's not how it works. Turns out that superior intelligence may help a person succeed, but it is far less important than these three major factors: the willingness to work and persist, belief in the outcome and the ability to form relationships. If you have these qualities, you will succeed. You don't need to be super smart, just intelligent enough to understand what you need to do.

I've known a lot of people who were very successful who were of average intelligence. These people were willing to put in years and years to build an enterprise. They were also able to establish relationships with significant and important people who helped them. For now, all you need to know is this:

** You are smart enough to succeed right now.
** You will have to work hard and be willing to put in a number of years.
** Your success will depend in large part on your ability to form relationships.

Intent is everything. Believing that you can succeed will make it happen. Strengthen your resolve with the use of a talisman. Incredible things will come to you!