My 7 Principles Towards Progress (Part I)

One of the questions I usually get asked, especially after my transition to my first leadership role, is how I was able to ascend that fast. This is an intriguing question that has made me think deeply about how to answer. I am not sure there is a single answer to it and I cannot speak for everyone, but I did try to identify the steps that I took, which in most cases I did unconsciously (until later in life did I understand the true rationale behind them), and where I based my decisions on. The answer-finding process helped me identify the principles that I relied heavily on.

This is one of the most fascinating topics for me and I am happy to expand further, but before I do that I want to make it clear that these principles are suitable for simply identifying ways to progress professionally and not just for moving to a leadership role; in fact, there is quite a bit more to becoming a leader. Hence, these 7 principles are a guide (my guide at least) towards becoming successful¹.

1. Be at the right place the right time (Luck)

Most people fall victims of different influence biases and when we see a successful person we may say "this person did this purely by luck" or "this person is very hard-working and owes nothing to luck". The truth is that these are the extremes of the spectrum and I think it is very healthy to accept the fact that luck is an important parameter in life.

Luck is to be given unique opportunities, meaning be at the right place at the right time with the right people and under the right conditions. That does not mean that luck is the most important principle, after all there are six more, but it is necessary to recognize it and make amends with that fact; most people do not want to give any credit to luck as if their intrinsic value is taken away, but the sooner we make amends with luck, the better it is.

Consider, for example, what may have happened if you were born 2000 years ago or in another country or in a different neighborhood or … or … and put yourselves in the shoes of the imaginary copy of yourself. In some cases you would have been better off and in some cases worse. The question is what do we do with the hand we are dealt with and not how our lives would have been in the alternatives.

2. Along with Athena move also your hand (Grasp the opportunities)

This is one of my favorite quotes, because it shows the significance of our own actions under given circumstances. I am a firm believer that we, the people, (1) have multiple choices at most junctions of our lives and (2) have the ability to pick up an opportunity upon our choice and run with it.

Opportunities appear in front of us all the time and the major questions that arise are:

• •Are we able to identify these opportunities? Namely, how wide/narrow are our blinders and how refined is our situational awareness?
• •Are we afraid/courageous to take the opportunity on?

At the end of the day, it is up to us to "move also our hand"!

There have been multiple occasions in my life where my colleagues and I were faced with the exact same challenges and opportunities, and I decided to take the non-conventional path. Sometime later people recognized that my decision was correct given how our paths evolved, but that might have been pure luck or I might have been better off not making the decision that I did.

At the end of the day the strong lesson here is twofold: (1) that fear plays a key role in the "move also your hand" principle and the earlier we become aware of our fears, the easier it will be to face them and make the tough decisions when time comes; and (2) that we need to constantly assess our situation and understand what our options are.

3. Know thyself (Self-awareness)

"Know thyself" is another of my favorite quotes, because it takes a whole life to answer this question and so far I probably have as many answered questions as open. That does not mean, however, we should not try to increase our self-awareness, and by self-awareness I mean what our core values are, how we react in specific situations, what are the behaviors we exhibit under different circumstances, and why are all of these the way they are.

Increasing our self-awareness is easier said than done and it requires multiple activities to start making progress. These may include specialized mindfulness training, therapy, coaching, meditation, team building activities and business simulations, and more.

Another way to increase our self-awareness is through controlled trial-n-error and at work there are many opportunities to get ourselves outside our comfort zone; take for example the work on a project that our skills may not be a good match for or not good enough. This allows us to push ourselves to our limits and explore what lies beyond our "self line-of-sight".

Are we able to handle the uncertainty? Are we able to handle the stress of a deadline when we have to learn? Are we able to make strong connections with other people and operate as a team? By exploring these boundaries we can get very quick feedback about ourselves, which we can then use to dig deeper inside us and self-improve.