Secrets behind the very high achieving of families you know?

[Santatree]

How come some families are so high achieving? Is it money? What way they parent? Private schools?

I disagree. I know a lot of very high achieving immigrants who come from nothing. It's attitude over anything else.

Working hard and not being a martyr. If you believe you can make your life better you can. So many people use their life's difficulties as excuses to not better themselves.

You don't become a high achiever by believing everyone can be one too, you have to be fully aware not everyone gets that chance or choice.

You get high achievers born in council houses, as well as others born in mansions. Achieving great things takes work no matter where you come from.

The brightest children I've known came from families where reading was encouraged and music was taught.

They've not all gone on to make piles of money but academically they have all excelled.

You’re missing my point — which is not that we’re exceptions at all. We’re only high-achieving in the sense that, unlike many of my schoolmates, we’re not addicts, involved in petty crime, or in prison.

I was asking the OP what kind or level of high achievement she had in mind — there’s a difference between ‘families where everyone does well at school and plays county-level sport’, ‘families where all siblings are surgeons/lawyers/ dentists’,and ‘families where siblings are winning the Nobel prize/ being global CEO of their own company at 30 etc.

I think the answers will be very different depending on which.

What do you have in mind when you think of 'high-achieving families', OP?

Which criteria would apply?

This in spades.

MN is very keen on the idea there are so many varying factors blocking their ability to do any better than they are/make more money etc. I'm sure some of these are genuine, but my personal experience is very little is off limits. Just a lot harder with no money/privileged upbringing and not many people want to put in a lot of work with no immediate reward when others may have had it easier.

The highest achieving family I know essentially hate each other.

Their family relationships are all centred around money and who is doing the best, like a constant game of top trumps. They’ve had a wonderful life of fantastic holidays and “stuff,” lots of “stuff,” but very little affection. Just seems like they buy each other’s love, or live in a competition.

I’m sure that’s not the case for everyone, but it’s never looked appealing!

I know some very successful high earners who (in their own words) came from complete shit holes. They had the drive to get out and be better than what they were brought up in.

I disagree with luck, that's the excuse used by lazy people.

That's nonsense sorry. You definitely need luck!! A lot if people work extremely hard and earn peanuts. Not all is about work ethic.

Conversely the high achievers I know are mostly people who don't enjoy reading and at least one of them has dyslexia.

Obviously some high achievers come from very challenging backgrounds. But most don't and it's ridiculous to pretend they do.

I'm not so sure. I consider myself as high-achieving (straight As at school, Oxbridge, postgraduate degrees) and we definitely had the "too cool for school attitude" in my family: we had lots of time off school and I learned a lot reading and writing at home.
I definitely haven't much work ethic: in fact, I have very strong ethical beliefs against the capitalist work ethic and the religious roots of work ethics, instead believing the aim of life should be community, time spent with those we love, and doing what we can to make the world a better place.
Most high achievers I know come from similarly hippie backgrounds where they had home ed or as much time off school as possible and weren't interested in jobs/careers, but believed in education for its own sake.

It is not all about money, I’m not suggesting that it doesn’t help, but it is not the totally deciding factor.
Where wealth does come into it is available time, and time is the factor.
If parents are juggling 3+ jobs between them, just to live moderately, actively encouraging their youngsters to engage with education and supporting them is very difficult.
This is an example from the ‘80’s, two parents both educated to A level standard, but neither educated to graduate standard. Very average income while children started school.
Both parents actively engaged with supporting and encouraging their children to reach their full potential within the state system, and take part in as many extra curricular activities as possible/feasible.
Outcome: one parent gained an open university degree, which they did alongside f/t working, while their children were in their adolescence/teens.
Both children gained respectable degrees.
So I think, time, attitude and commitment are the main factors, and encouraging children to make the most of any opportunities- not all children are bright, but the ones who are encouraged and supported will do the best with their chances in life.

I think "high achieving" needs to be defined. It is all a matter of values. Someone could be an uneducated but brilliant carer or foster parent - I would rate their achievements as being far higher than those of a high earner playing about with pretend money on the stock market floor.

Yes, in fact, the people who work hardest tend to be considered "low" achievers by such measurements: manual workers, cleaners working two or three jobs to send money home, for example.

Both my brother and I think are high acheieving. Not super duper high achieving but have progressed well in our professions. The key I think is parents. Parents who encourage you do well at school and realise the value of education.

My dad was working class very poor growing up, but from a young age he knew if he studied hard at school he could escape the cycle of low paid jobs.

He did that, got into uni and now living in a £1m+ house in a very nice city in the U.K.

I suppose his studying hard but transferred to me and my brother in some way.

They are Indian. Enough said!

The problem then starts when their children, who grew up in more comfortable situations, don’t have the same drive as their parents, because they don’t have poverty and dysfunction as a motivator, and their parents get frustrated with their lack of oomph. My DS is certainly a lot less focused than I was at his age, but I’m trying to look on that as a positive — he’s not desperate to escape his environment. He has the confidence to know he can screw up and not have wrecked all his chances.

Absolutely this.

I think it’s a combination of factors but health and money are both the very important ones. I don’t mean that people need a lot of money but sufficient to be comfortable in life and to have variety of little things which make life richer and easier.

Schools play a role.

It's harder to do well in poor schools - DH managed it with natural ability and drive and wanting more than local area had to offer. DS did well at school that was for bulk of his time there in special measures mainly due to home life - they very nearly pushed him and DD2 off the rails and it's home support that kept them on track.

Different area and school DD1 and likely DS would have been diagnosed with DD1 earlier and Ds at all - and had access to support in school system.

DD2 with a higher achieving cohort would as she's quietly competitive be working harder - she pits herself against the best and holds her own but higher cohort she'd pick up her game.

Post education - some careers you need contacts and access to informal network - and if you don't have that it can take much longer or even be impossible and worth jumping to other careers - others like Uncle and DH you get to places at about right time but without contacts probably had to work harder better to do it.

Basically we all in a hole climbing a ladder out - we all start at different rungs - if you start lower down can still get to the top but you need to be better climbers than those who started higher up. Those higher up can still fall off or not really climb at all.

A lot of what comes up in these threads is what I would consider basic parenting - talking to your kids taking an interest in their lives and education showing them the wider world.

I beg to differ. They might have arrived with nothing, but they had the resources to get out of wherever they came from and the ones who have been successful are generally the equivalent of our middle classes in their own countries. Take Sunak's parents, for example.

Best answer on the thread.

Money to throw at any situation (wether that’s private school, activities, university, able to support them financially whilst they do internships etc)
And never content to sit still and relax - always all go, and high energy.
High expectations and no notion that they won’t be able to achieve those expectations - doesn’t cross their minds to have self doubt.