In his highly recommended book ‘Power: Why Some People Have It—and Others Don’t‘, Jeffrey Pfeffer insists that “performance doesn’t guarantee success”. And this is true bith on a personal and on a professional level. It also works for companies – even great products may not sell!
Success requires something more than just great performance. It requires marketing skills and political savvy-ness to be able to navigate within the organization, the market, the institutional setup. Unfortunately this may also lead those that have those extra skills to be very successful without necessarily the performance attached to it.
As the theory of constraints also shows, local performance in an interlinked system with other entities that are not performing will not save the entire system. It is a waste (the myth of the hero does not exist)
Thus, the fact that pure performance is not the first deciding aspect is a reality that needs to be taken into account in all our endeavors. We also have to hone our skills of influencing, managing our bosses and clients, and in general, marketing our abilities. A good balance will create success.
What about you?
