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The truth about career advice:

99% of it isn't backed by any science or data.

Instead, here are 5 science-backed insights to accelerate your career:
1. Performance drives success ― but only when it is measurable.

In areas where performance can be measured, like school grades or sports, the best way to succeed is to focus on improving your performance.

However ―
2. When performance can't be measured, your network drives your success.

In careers where performance can't be easily measured, like art and brand marketing, your success is determined by how your peers perceive your performance.
If you find yourself in a career where your performance is hard to measure, building a network and communicating the quality of your work is just as important as the quality of the work itself.
3. Find ways to stand out.

Performance is bounded but success is unbounded:

The top athletes or employees are only a few percentage points better than their colleagues ― but their income can be 5-10x higher than their peers.

Find ways to be top 1% in some aspect of your job.
4. Future Success = Previous Success x Fitness

Contrary to popular career advice, failure does not lead to success ― only success leads to success.

While failure may be an important part of the learning process, analysis of successful careers shows a pattern of past wins.
The best predictor of an author's books sales is how many books the author has sold previously.

And the best predictor of a product's future Amazon reviews are its past reviews.

Small wins turn into bigger wins with time. Success begets more success.
2 reasons why this might be the case:

• Success gives you the confidence that will lead you attempt future successful endeavours.

• Preferential attachment ― people view people and products with a track record of past success more favourably than those who don't.
5. A harsh truth ― people always attribute the success of a team to one person.

Research on the subject shows that while collective team effort is critical to the team's success, only one person receives most of the credit (usually the team leader).
6. With persistence, success can come at any time.

On the flip side, one of the most encouraging findings was a strong correlation between productivity and success.

The more work you put out year after year, the more likely you are to succeed overtime.
7. Turn ideas into something tangible.

Alongside productivity, the researchers found that the person's success overtime was strongly linked to their ability to turn ideas into something tangible, like a product or service that other people can benefit from.
Want to learn more?

Check out the source of this thread:

The Formula by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi
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