To think a lot of people earning 6 figures aren’t actually that smart, just lucky?

[SnarkyDenimFox]

I’ve met plenty of high earners and honestly, a lot of them don’t seem any sharper than the rest of us. Right place, right time, right connections. AIBU to think it’s often luck, not talent?

This is such a good point.

I have 4DC all older than primary now, but all still requiring “facilitation” of some sort or another.

I have a c suite role in a global MNC and travel extensively for work; I’m a trustee and chair a board; I write books and have always have a qualification of some sort on the go; I do yoga, Pilates and ride as well as volunteer in a sporting activity and walk the dog everyday; I have a busy social life, like you cook from scratch when home and throw an excellent party ;)

I rarely feel stressed, operate well under pressure and time constraints and periods of feeling lethargic seem to coincide with a lull in activities

It takes some thought and planning to be in the right place and the right time - eg in a career it’s choosing profession, company, projects to work on and change them in order to improve earning potential and realise the opportunities. Working on your network and soft skills.
you have to want to earn 6 figures and actively working to get there by bettering your skills and options.

Typically staying in the same job is a sure fire way to a mediocre salary, the quickest jumps in pay for me are the result of changing job every 18-36 months. I doubled my salary in 3 years with two great moves. Not luck, no special connections.

The very high earner I know is quite bright and works very hard. But most importantly he knows how to present himself. He would be utterly mortified if his colleagues knew what he was really like.

I really think this is just a temperament thing - about different people's capacity

That is also true. A family friend and I, (similar life as far as DC, living arrangements, health etc are concerned) were doing the same activity. She told me that she needs to quit now, because she was a SAHM but now got a very part time job, so she doesn't have time for it any more. (It's not due to hours clashing). Whereas I manage with my very full time job plus several trustee/volunteer roles.
This is the same woman who said she can't work wednesdays, because when will she do her grocery shopping then??

Before someone comments that I clearly don't like her much, yes I do, she's otherwise lovely really, and very smart. But clearly finds life more challenging than I do. And is unlikely to ever earn 6 figures, to get back to the topic of this thread.

I’m on 6 figures now and freely admit there was a fair bit of luck involved in getting here in the sense I a) certainly did not come from a privileged background b) went to uni to do an arts degree but didn’t finish it c) fell into the industry I’m in for the sake of getting ‘any office job’ and d) did not aim for or strive to achieve a 6 figure salary.

Four years ago I was on £37k, I was headhunted by two companies at once and ended up in a Dutch auction situation which culminated in being offered £82k to move, for the same role. One pay rise and one promotion to senior management later, I find myself here. I’m as surprised as anyone to be honest. I haven’t even done an interview since 2017. 🤷‍♀️

This is an interesting and varied thread about success. I've effectively retired now but DH is edging on 70 and still going to the office every morning at 8:00 or 8:15, but it is his company that he started 33 years ago, and the issue is finding a successor. We have had three near-sales that would, I think, have created business value, and when those ran out of steam DH spent several more years picking and training a person to fill his shoes. Last summer that person said they didn't want the worry of waking at 2 am and resigned to go back to comfortable paid employment -- having just inherited a house. Our micro business is very profitable and specialist but the commercial skills and more important, the willingness to take a risk are missing. Over the 33 years that DH has been in business, we've had Asda Christmas and Christmas at Harrods. We've always had enough to eat, but we haven't always had anything for holidays.

Yes it's luck and aptitude and hard work.....but so much of it is having the self belief and confidence, which your parents and school nurture. Someone with poor self esteem and lack of confidence in themselves is unlikely to "make it" to a six figure salary.

Personally, within my family, this really isn’t the case. My parents generation was the first to access higher education and they did so in numbers, but without financial backing from their family. My grandparents, were immigrants, born into extreme poverty and hugely motivated to improve the outcome of the lives of their children through promoting education in any form and sheer hard work. Out of the second generation, the individuals who went on to become particularly successful in their field are regarded as exceptionally determined even within the family.

This has also been my experience throughout life in general. I tend to agree with those who have suggested that highly successful individuals often share a common trait and that is an elevated determination to succeed; grabbing opportunities with both hands whenever they are presented.

Obviously there are always exceptions and high intellect and inherited wealth aren’t going to go against you either!

We've never been short of self-belief or ambition, but we have bred a child who is struggling to find a path, although neither stupid nor lacking energy. The SM view that one should follow the dream has a lot to answer for IMO. I'm a bit ashamed that I encouraged it. But it did not look so precarious at the time.

I do believe if you work hard at school and university you reap the rewards, but once you have your foot in the door it can become who you know for far up the ladder you progress.

Ime experience even when it’s about intelligence- it’s still a little about luck. In law at least, the top companies are able to demand 1st class degrees and perfect academics, which means every applicant is intellectually gifted (in a way) but with a 1000 applicants for 10 roles there remains a huge element of luck.

I think self belief is the main thing in my experience and a little bit of luck, I have earned very highly in a niche area in technology and its absolutely my confidence in my abilities that gave me the motivation to study/work hard. I'm not saying the harder I work the luckier I get, there are plenty of people around me that work hard but they don't necessarily have the belief that they should have in themselves and don't have the confidence to back themselves in front of managers or stand up to other colleagues even if they are right.

I think men are better at this self belief business where it comes to work and thats why we still have a gender pay gap.

@ishimbob I agree with you on that -we have a business ( 22 years) and my Hs friend said he simply wouldn’t be prepared to be doing work stuff in an evening ( unless he was on an evening shift) or taking the odd call, answering a few emails on holiday etc - a lot of better paying prospects in life require a flexible mentality with regards to ‘time’ - the same goes for location - if you live in an area with few highly paid roles then your options are often more limited if you either expect a good job on your doorstep or won’t commute or even move areas - I’m not saying people ‘should’ but don’t be suprised if your income stays fairly static due to wanting the status quo

And were you offering your husbands friend a six figure salary if he answered a few out of hours emails? or was it a carrot to entice him to work for free out of hours on an average salary so you and your husbands business would profit from his free work...

I earn a six figure salary (200k) and still struggle to believe it, I went to a pretty rough secondary school and got fairly average grades. I’m dyslexic but having to work harder than everyone else to get the same grades paid off in the end as it installed a real drive to succeed. I managed my parents through their divorce and one of them through their substance abuse from a very young age, and although damaging it did equip me in some ways to manage emotions and keep the peace, I’m a good negotiator. I will take risks and put my head on the line for what I believe is right, as I’ve moved up the ranks I’ve been shocked at how few people are prepared to own a decision and take true responsibility if it doesn’t work out. Finally, I’ve always made my manager’s life easier and been loyal to them and my colleagues. That said, I don’t think I work harder than a nurse and the pay system in this country is screwed. Luck has definitely played a big part too, but I don’t have the confidence to match the pay cheque and probably never will.

I don't know. I was a privileged child although unremarkable at school and dropped out of uni. I went to finishing school and did a secretarial course. I wouldn’t say I ever had any innate ambition and certainly no wish to be in charge or powerful and I've seen many of those types crash and burn.

I got my first permanent job in an investment bank because I told the friend of the father of a chap I was seeing that I was looking for a job and could type. He gave me his card and told me to ring him when we were all back in London. I did, he introduced me to the Head of Bond Sales who wanted a secretary. I liked it, I showed an interest, got moved to the syndicate desk and moved onto the sales floor. The first year I earnt £100k was 1987!

I was better at work than at school. I'd say hardworking, sharp witted and aimed to please - and kept my personal stuff personal.

One could say it was down to privilege but I had seven years off and went back to work locally when the youngest was settled in reception. I started at the very bottom and worked hard, found solutions and was genial. They created an Assistant role for me and funded professional quals and with one org change (public sector) I worked my way up to Director and £100k plus again.

As I did it twice, I'd say it's more than luck or privilege and about graft, nouse and delivering solutions and results. Probably a bit of leadership too although that was never evident at school.

One thing I've scored very highly on in psychometric testing has been the ability to analyse, and I mean sky high scores.

There's also something about being steady and maintaining a very stable personal life and golly I threw a few frogs back very swiftly.

DH on the other hand just has a brain the size of a planet and was driven by his profession as a calling. He was also very niche so very sought after and whilst I worked hard, he was and remains a workaholic.

I can understand that. Neither of ours have the hunger we had because they have had everything. In some respects I'm glad they have been able to follow their dreams. One academic/Lecturer and one secondary school teacher. Not what we imagined.

It's both. You need to have been born and raised in a conducive environment (i.e. if I had been born a woman in Afghanistan, I wouldn't have had a chance), and you also need luck (if my health had been crap, or I had been paralysed, I wouldn't be where I am either). But a lot of it is confidence, stubbornness and the ability to take risks, and get up after you fall.

I work as a midwife, in a lowish-income Western country. However, I have managed to turn this profession into a high-earning enterprise by working casual and self-employed, and taking on a couple of specialised roles, among them one I just landed recently, working for an international organisation teaching very niche skills to other healthcare professionals nationwide and internationally. As a result, this year I am on route to making the equivalent to GBP$100,000 in local currency, which is way beyond what most midwives here could dream (even though most of them work way more hours than I do).

But most midwives here are not ambitious, show very poor confidence (often they are actually really good, but they don't show confidence, which is what convinces others that you are, indeed, good, and deserving of your professional respect), don't dare to ask for more money than what they get offered, and in fact work a lot of their hours for free out of a misplaced sense of "duty". They feel "guilty" if they care about how much they earn. Impostor syndrome is rife among them.

I don't. I decided a long time ago that I would act and think like a man, and it has worked very well for me. I negotiate every job that does not offer me what I think is a fair pay for my work. But in order to do this I ensure I am the best at what I do and that my work is impeccable, safe and that the women/colleagues I work with are extremely happy with their care/training.

One example: a primary unit 1 hr drive away from my home needed a casual midwife to do ocassional 12 hour night shifts there. They offered X pay, which was fair for the actual hours worked, but nothing else. My response: "Pay is ok, but this is an hour away from my residence, so I want mileage on top, and as I will be called out of the blue in the middle of the day to go to work all night, I want a place to sleep some hours after the shift, so I am safe driving back home". Initially I got told they couldn't pay for that, and that "other midwives in the area don't ask for those privileges", so I answered: "Great, then please call those other midwives. I'll be here if you change your mind. Good luck!". 3 days later I got a call. Surprise, surprise, she found that they could indeed pay me mileage and get me to stay at the nurses accommodation for free. So then I said yes.

Of course I have lost contracts where they didn't offer enough or they didn't come back to me, but I can assure you I have never been low in offers of work, especially when you leave behind a reputation of being good at your job. And I have actually found that, the more demanding of pay and privileges you are, the more respect you get and the more they call you. The midwives who offer to do the work for $200/day ("oh, that's enough for me, I don't need that much") often are the same ones who refuse to take on complicated cases, don't keep their skills up, only want to do shifts in postnatal ward, are unreliable and/or are shit at managing emergencies, so after a while their employers keep coming back to me. They know I can be called to do a home birth at the top of a hill, or fly a woman with raging pre-eclampsia to another hospital and then stay and resuscitate their baby before being flown back.

So yes, luck plays an important role. But in order to take advantage of luck, you have to be ready, and be brave to make quick, sometimes risky decisions. If you have these qualities, and money is what you want, you can make money basically in ANY profession and any area.

Another example: even the midwives who work permanently employed in a hospital, they end up doing overtime or missing their lunch break often... and they don't claim for these hours! "Oh, it's ok, it's just $25 after all". "Nah, I'm fine". Others don't put themselves "on call" when asked to come at a particular time out of the blue, so they get paid for normal hours instead of "callback" time that they would be entitled to. This results in a massive difference in pay they are, for some unknown reason, not taking. Some self-employed midwives will not claim for small jobs they do here and there for which they would be entitled for payment. It is beyond my comprehension sometimes, really.

I claim for EVERYTHING I am entitled to. Every 15 minutes of extra time I work, every meeting or mandatory education session I attend (why wouldn't I? It's work done during my supposedly free time!) and for every single lunch/dinner break I miss due to acuity. I calculate that, thanks to this, I earn between $5,000-$10,000 more a year (many of these hours are paid at overtime rates).

I check every single payslip to make sure there are no mistakes. I find the hospitals tend to make mistakes, and never in the employee/contractor's favour. As a result of this, I calculate I get another $1000-$1500 a year that I wouldn't be getting otherwise. Most of my colleagues never check their payslips for errors.

Most of my colleagues miss on all this money due to being too "humble" to claim it, or because they can't be bothered with the paperwork.

Yes, you're absolutely right to mention location as part of this.

When I graduated, I took it as read that I would live wherever the best career opportunity was. It actually never occurred to me to do anything else. I have moved a few times for work, including internationally. Have now settled in London as we have children in school but selected London to give us the best career opportunities.

I see people on here saying "oh I live very rurally and there's no childcare so I can't work" and I just don't get why they live there? But it's different priorities, I think. But the good opportunities don't just come to you, in your rural location, you have to go and find them.

I'm going to preface this by saying my husband is an amazing dad..... But sometimes I look at him and think how on earth are you responsible for that team and the job you do. It's a running joke in our house- he can barely remember the kids water bottles on a day out sometimes. Checklist? No point be arsed he doesn't check it. If he didn't work from home and I didnt over hear meetings and see his work persona, I'd really wonder sometimes. My point is ,people dont stay in jobs if they're not good at them regardless of connections and right time, they also switch hats. So they might not seem street smart or whatever else that makes them seem "the average Joe" like you and I. But they're smashing their roles at work, which is why they're employed in them.

See, I don’t really agree with that. In my experience of working with lots of people who earn 6 or 7 figures (I know loads) then there’s confidence but there’s also a MASSIVE sense of insecurity, not being good enough, success just being temporary. Probably their mummies never really loved them or something.

That’s the engine that takes you from £200k to £1m. It’s the combination of brass neck and imposter syndrome that really drives it.

Almost the same here. My generation in my family (but I am in my 70's) was the first in my family to access education beyond age 16. We achieved it because improving our lives and enjoying the fruits of that improvement were modelled to us by our parents. Our efforts and successes were cheered on and celebrated. Being personally and financially independent was emphasised, even though my parents enjoyed a long and happy marriage. Same with my late husband who came from a similar background. We had no "in", no family money or connections and yes, the harder we worked, the luckier we got.