sweetnpetite
Intellectual snob
- Joined
- Jan 10, 2003
- Posts
- 9,135
By Diane Stafford, The Kansas City Star
At how many class reunions have some of the most successful alumni been the former cutups, the nerds, the nonconformists?
Plenty. Sometimes, the nose-to-the-grindstone brains who got into the competitive colleges and the star athletes who got great publicity are the ones who prosper. Often, though, there are surprises.
What happens to vault high school's underperformers into the top ranks of business? Sometimes they're simply late bloomers who didn't have goals and direction until later in life. Other times they heard the different drummer and marched down new roads, finding financial success in innovation.
Fear can be a big motivator, too, suggests a recent survey of more than 200 chief executives of Fortune 1,000-type companies. Forty-three percent of the CEO respondents to a survey by Jericho Communications said they were most motivated by fear. Trailing motivators were a lust for power, cited by 22 percent, and wealth, cited by 7 percent.
Some other perhaps surprising revelations by the CEOs:
- Their mothers were more influential than their fathers. More than twice as many said that their mothers were their idols and that they were closer to their mothers than their fathers.
- Only 4 percent considered themselves very popular in grade school. Fifty-nine percent said they were unpopular.
- Fifty-eight percent said they watched or played sports while growing up, but only 17 percent played sports competitively in high school or college.
- Reading was the most popular activity for more than four out of five of the CEOs while growing up.
All of which should give hope and confidence to young people -- and their parents -- who despair of finding the right career and who worry about their future chances for success. Success sometimes comes late and in unpredictable ways.
That's not to recommend a let-the-chips-fall-where-they-may attitude. Betting money continues to be on those who have a plan (or two) and prepare themselves with education, training and relationship-building.
But it is to say that it's dangerous to write someone off as ill-suited for business simply because he or she cut classes or didn't quite fit in as a teenager. There are multiple opportunities for fresh starts along every career path.
Just for fun, here are some of the most-admired people mentioned by the CEOs in the survey. Deeper analysis might reveal qualities that any aspiring success story should have:
Most admired CEO: Jack Welch, followed by Warren Buffett.
Best political leader alive today: Colin Powell, followed by Tony Blair.
Best female leader alive today: Margaret Thatcher, by an overwhelming margin.
And, really for fun, the CEOs were asked to consider the firmament of Hollywood stars and name those who would make the best CEOs. The top vote-getters, in order: Tom Hanks, Michael Douglas, Robert Redford, Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise.
Similarly, top CEO material among musicians were selected. The winners were Sting, Madonna, Bono, Cher and Dr. Dre. Clearly, self-marketing savvy is prized.
http://msn.careerbuilder.com/Custom...4f46c16f1443b68c975428fba20489-151155431-te-1
At how many class reunions have some of the most successful alumni been the former cutups, the nerds, the nonconformists?
Plenty. Sometimes, the nose-to-the-grindstone brains who got into the competitive colleges and the star athletes who got great publicity are the ones who prosper. Often, though, there are surprises.
What happens to vault high school's underperformers into the top ranks of business? Sometimes they're simply late bloomers who didn't have goals and direction until later in life. Other times they heard the different drummer and marched down new roads, finding financial success in innovation.
Fear can be a big motivator, too, suggests a recent survey of more than 200 chief executives of Fortune 1,000-type companies. Forty-three percent of the CEO respondents to a survey by Jericho Communications said they were most motivated by fear. Trailing motivators were a lust for power, cited by 22 percent, and wealth, cited by 7 percent.
Some other perhaps surprising revelations by the CEOs:
- Their mothers were more influential than their fathers. More than twice as many said that their mothers were their idols and that they were closer to their mothers than their fathers.
- Only 4 percent considered themselves very popular in grade school. Fifty-nine percent said they were unpopular.
- Fifty-eight percent said they watched or played sports while growing up, but only 17 percent played sports competitively in high school or college.
- Reading was the most popular activity for more than four out of five of the CEOs while growing up.
All of which should give hope and confidence to young people -- and their parents -- who despair of finding the right career and who worry about their future chances for success. Success sometimes comes late and in unpredictable ways.
That's not to recommend a let-the-chips-fall-where-they-may attitude. Betting money continues to be on those who have a plan (or two) and prepare themselves with education, training and relationship-building.
But it is to say that it's dangerous to write someone off as ill-suited for business simply because he or she cut classes or didn't quite fit in as a teenager. There are multiple opportunities for fresh starts along every career path.
Just for fun, here are some of the most-admired people mentioned by the CEOs in the survey. Deeper analysis might reveal qualities that any aspiring success story should have:
Most admired CEO: Jack Welch, followed by Warren Buffett.
Best political leader alive today: Colin Powell, followed by Tony Blair.
Best female leader alive today: Margaret Thatcher, by an overwhelming margin.
And, really for fun, the CEOs were asked to consider the firmament of Hollywood stars and name those who would make the best CEOs. The top vote-getters, in order: Tom Hanks, Michael Douglas, Robert Redford, Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise.
Similarly, top CEO material among musicians were selected. The winners were Sting, Madonna, Bono, Cher and Dr. Dre. Clearly, self-marketing savvy is prized.
http://msn.careerbuilder.com/Custom...4f46c16f1443b68c975428fba20489-151155431-te-1
