What makes people powerful
Power gets a bad rap, but only because people pursue it for the wrong reasons. When power is pursued for the right reasons, it can be a tremendous force for good. Niccolo Machiavelli spread the belief that people can only become powerful by exploiting the worst aspects of human nature.
- One of this teachings was, “A wise ruler ought never to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interests.” Machiavelli was essentially saying that you’re an idiot if you keep your promises or stick to your values when you’d benefit more by breaking them.
- Not only did we hear it from Machiavelli, but also from plenty of voices in our own time, such as Robert Greene, who said, “The key to power is the ability to judge who is best able to further your interests in all situations.” It’s no wonder so many people think that the only way to get power is to be a jerk.
Fortunately, Machiavelli and Greene had something in common: They were both wrong. Recent research from UC Berkeley shows that when it comes to power, nice guys finish first. The researchers found that the most powerful people (according to ratings from their peers) were those who were the most considerate and outgoing.
- They also found that those who were the most Machiavellian—using things like gossip and manipulation to gain power—were quickly identified and isolated and ended up with no power at all.
- Studies like these are rehabilitating power’s bad rap.
- Power isn’t inherently evil, and it isn’t inherently bad to seek power.
Without power, you can’t accomplish anything, good or evil. Even those who want nothing more than to make the world a better place, can’t do so without exerting the influence of personal power. It’s the abuse of power and the underhanded things people do to achieve it that cause problems.
People who earn and use power wisely have a profound impact on everyone they encounter. Yet, they achieve this power only because they exert so much influence inside, on themselves. We see only their outside; we see them innovate, speak their mind, and propel themselves forward toward bigger and better things.
Yet, we’re missing the best part. The confidence and wherewithal that make their influence possible are earned. And while what people are influenced by changes with the season, the unique habits of powerful people remain constant. Their focused pursuit of excellence is driven by eleven habits, which you can emulate and absorb until your power and influence expand: They don’t wait for a title to lead.
It’s important not to confuse power with authority. The right title can give you authority, but it can’t give you power. On the other hand, you don’t need a title to be powerful. You can lead without being a boss and you can have a powerful influence upon your workplace and community without a title. They’re graciously disruptive.
Powerful people are never satisfied with the status quo. They’re the ones who constantly ask, “What if?” and “Why not?” They’re not afraid to challenge conventional wisdom, and they don’t disrupt things for the sake of being disruptive; they do so to make things better.
- They think for themselves.
- Powerful people aren’t buffeted by the latest trend or by public opinion.
- They form their opinions carefully, based on the facts.
- They’re more than willing to change their mind when the facts support it, but they aren’t influenced by what other people think, only by what they know,
They focus only on what really matters. Powerful people aren’t distracted by trivialities. They’re able to cut through the static and clutter, focus on what matters, and point it out to everyone else. They speak only when they have something important to say, and they never bore people with idle banter.
- They master conflict.
- People tend to err on one of two extremes when it comes to conflict: some are passive and avoid conflict altogether, while others seek out conflict aggressively, thinking that this will make them powerful.
- People who master conflict know how to approach it directly and assertively, yet constructively.
Truly powerful people do not react emotionally and defensively to dissenting opinions—they welcome them. They’re humble enough to know that they don’t know everything and that someone else might see something they missed. And if that person is right, they embrace the idea wholeheartedly, because they care more about the end result than being right.
They inspire conversation. When powerful people speak, their words spread like ripples in a pond. Influencers inspire everyone around them to explore new ideas and to think differently about their work. They know their strengths and weaknesses. People who get seduced by power and, therefore, start abusing it are often blind to their own weaknesses.
To become truly powerful, you have to see yourself as you really are and to position yourself to use your strengths for the greater good. That means taking a clear-eyed look at your strengths and your weaknesses and owning them both completely. They grow and leverage their networks.
Those who grow power the Machiavellian way don’t bother with people who aren’t useful to them. People see this coming a mile away, and it doesn’t win any friends. Truly powerful people know how to make lasting connections. Not only do they know a lot of people, they get to know their connections’ connections.
More importantly, they add value to everyone in their network. They share advice and know how, and they make connections between people who should get to know each other. They ask for help when they need it. It’s easy to mistakenly assume that powerful people never ask for help from anybody.
Asking for help when you don’t know the answer or can’t do it all by yourself is not a sign of weakness; it’s a sign of strength. It sends the message that you’re not so insecure as to put your ego above the mission. It takes a tremendous amount of confidence and humility to admit that you need assistance, and asking for assistance is critical, because there’s nothing worse than trucking down the wrong path when you’re too embarrassed or proud to admit that you don’t know what you’re doing.
They believe. Powerful people always expect the best. They believe in their own power to achieve their dreams, and they believe that others share that same power. They believe that nothing is out of reach and that belief inspires those around them to stretch for their own goals.
- They firmly believe that one person can change the world.
- They do it now,
- Way back in 1894, Orison Swett Marden made an important point: “Don’t wait for extraordinary opportunities.
- Seek common occasions and make them great.
- Weak men wait for opportunities.
- Strong men make them.” If you put off growing your power until the right opportunity comes along, it’s never going to happen.
Powerful people know that developing power is a lot like lifting weights or running a 5K. The only way to strengthen those muscles is by using them, so stop making excuses and just start. You know what you believe in, you know who you are, and you know what you want to become, so act like it.
What gives a person power?
In the workplace (and in life), we have different types of power at our disposal. Some of it is positional, meaning the power or authority is assigned based on position or rank in an organization. And then there is personal power. But what is personal power? Personal power comes from a combination of positive traits and characteristics,
Who is Elon Musk’s IQ?
Like, is Elon Musk a genius? It answered, Elon Musk’s IQ is reported to be 155, which is very high compared to the average of 100.
Who is the richest man in Europe?
2021
Rank | Name | Country |
---|---|---|
1 | Bernard Arnault | France |
2 | Amancio Ortega | Spain |
3 | Françoise Bettencourt Meyers | France |
4 | François Pinault | France |
Who is more rich than Elon
Elon Musk is no longer the world’s richest person after being overtaken—again—by French billionaire Bernard Arnault. Already a subscriber? Sign in
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Learn more about the subscription offers. On Tuesday, Fortune reported that Arnault—founder of luxury goods conglomerate LVMH—had been overtaken in the ranking by Musk, whose net worth was boosted as Tesla shares enjoyed a major rally. However, shares of the world’s most valuable carmaker—where much of Musk’s fortune is tied up—tumbled more than 5% on Wednesday after traders were left disappointed by Tesla’s 2023 Investor Day.
According to Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index, which tracks the real-time wealth of the world’s richest people, Musk lost more than $1.9 billion on Wednesday—causing him to slide into second place behind the LVMH boss. Arnault’s wealth, meanwhile, went up by around $2 billion, after a €1.5 billion ($1.6 billion) share buyback sent the company’s stock ticking upward and cemented its status as Europe’s most valuable firm,
However, Paris-listed LVMH stock was trading around 1% lower during European trading hours on Thursday. Bloomberg puts Arnault and Musk’s net worths at $186 billion and $184 billion respectively. A separate wealth ranking by Forbes also estimates that Arnault’s wealth has overtaken Musk’s once more.
The Forbes tracker, which uses a slightly different methodology from Bloomberg, estimates Arnault’s net worth at $205 billion and Musk’s at $194 billion. Arnault, who serves as LVMH’s chairman and CEO, controls about half of the luxury goods giant. He became its majority shareholder in 1989. Musk, meanwhile, saw his wealth propelled upward with the meteoric rise in value of Tesla share prices, which rose more than 4,000% in the decade since their IPO.
He also owns more than 40% of existing shares in SpaceX, according to CNBC, which was reportedly given a private valuation of $137 billion last month. Despite remaining one of the richest people on the planet, Musk’s wealth has fallen drastically on the back of his Twitter acquisition and a raft of problems at Tesla, including slowing sales,
- In late 2021, Forbes named him the richest person in history with a fortune nearing $300 billion.
- The tight and changeable gap between the two men’s wealth has seen them switch places in the ranking of world’s wealthiest people numerous times over the past year.
- At the end of 2022, Arnault surpassed Musk to become the world’s richest person, as Tesla shares suffered a major selloff in the wake of Musk’s $44 billion purchase of Twitter.
He had briefly overtaken Musk just a week earlier. Learn how to navigate and strengthen trust in your business with The Trust Factor, a weekly newsletter examining what leaders need to succeed. Sign up here.
Is Elon Musk most powerful person?
New York CNN Business — In December, Time caught some serious flak for naming Elon Musk “Person of the Year.” Less than five months after that announcement, it’s hard to argue the magazine was anything but right on the mark. Hardly any other person has wielded as much influence over such wide-ranging industries that could define the future of the global economy: social media, space travel, autonomous driving, electric transportation and artificial intelligence.
- Now the CEO of Tesla, the world’s most valuable car company, and SpaceX, whose mission is no less than figuring out how to transport human life to other planets in case Earth becomes unsustainable, is taking over Twitter, the platform he believes is essential to the future of democracy itself.
- Love him or hate him, Musk is not only the world’s richest person, he is arguably its most powerful, too.
Twitter has come a long way from its early free-for-all days. The platform has made big improvements moderating content and suspending accounts that harass other users or peddle misinformation. But Musk has made clear he believes Twitter has overcorrected.
- I think we want to be very reluctant to delete things and just be very cautious with permanent bans,” Musk said earlier this month at a TED conference.
- He added that “timeouts” are better than full-blown bans.
- In taking the company private, Musk will face little resistance to lowering content moderation guardrails that his predecessors put up.
Those who’ve previously run afoul of Twitter’s policies could be reinstated. Content that might have once triggered a warning about, say, Covid vaccine misinformation, may once again be fair game. “If in doubt, let the speech exist,” Musk said at the TED conference.
If it’s a gray area, I would say, let the tweet exist. But obviously in the case where there’s perhaps a lot of controversy, you would not necessarily want to promote that tweet.” Twitter is a fraction of the size of Facebook (FB) or TikTok, but its value lies in its concentration of elite political and media figures who’ve made it their primary megaphone.
Twitter is where news and feuds break out in real time, steering the national conversation on any given day. No other platform has been able to replicate Twitter’s messaging utility, and not for lack of trying. It was Donald Trump’s primary communication tool for the years leading up to and throughout his presidency, before Twitter banned him over his role in the January 6 insurrection.
What makes Elon Musk so powerful?
Some of CEO and entrepreneur Elon Musk ‘s most polarizing attributes may have also enabled his success so far, says biographer Walter Isaacson. Musk has become well-known for seemingly impulsive decisions and controversial statements on his social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
That reckless streak can’t be separated out from Musk’s track record of innovation at companies like Tesla and SpaceX, Isaacson told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Tuesday. “He has these enraging qualities, these drives and these demons, but if you pull those out, you don’t have the impulsive character that sets things off,” said Isaacson, who shadowed Musk for two years while researching his book, which published on Tuesday.
Specifically, Musk’s willingness to take chances and speak his mind helped make him the world’s richest person and one of its most powerful entrepreneurs, the biographer said: “If you don’t have the whole cloth of Elon Musk, you’re not going to get the innovation.” None of that excuses Musk’s “bad behavior,” like taking his ” foul mood ” out on his employees or challenging Mark Zuckerberg to a physical fight, Isaacson noted.
- And multiple other successful but hard-charging tech icons have recently expressed remorse about how they have treated their employees.
- Mark Cuban, for example, regrets making his team suffer through his laser-focus on results and productivity earlier in his career.
- I wish somebody would have told me to be nicer,” Cuban told the “Bio Eats World” podcast in June.
“Because I was always go, go, go. Ready, fire, aim. Let’s go. Let’s go faster, faster.” Bill Gates’ fixation on results made him an overbearing boss at Microsoft, he told students at Northern Arizona University’s commencement ceremony in May. “I didn’t believe in vacations.
I didn’t believe in weekends. I didn’t believe the people I worked with should either,” Gates said, adding that he didn’t realize he needed to change until he became a dad. Microsoft’s current CEO, Satya Nadella, takes almost the complete opposite approach: He puts the company’s people first, he told Harvard Business Review in 2021.
Empathy is “at the heart of design thinking,” said Nadella, who assumed the role in 2014. ” the source of all innovation.” He’s been undeniably effective. In Nadella’s first four and a half years at the helm, Microsoft tripled its stock price, Currently, the company’s market cap is $2.5 trillion, as of Wednesday afternoon.
- Musk lacks “the empathy gene,” Isaacson said, echoing similar comments from Musk’s own brother Kimbal in 2021.
- He’s unlikely to mellow out — or care more about others’ opinions — any time soon, Isaacson added: He doesn’t see the benefit.
- Musk would say you are actually being selfish if you’re sitting there hoping the people in front of you like you,” said Isaacson.
“As opposed to cutting off that sense of emotional connection and saying, ‘What’s best for the larger mission?'” DON’T MISS: Want to be smarter and more successful with your money, work & life? Sign up for our new newsletter! Want to earn more and land your dream job? Join the free CNBC Make It: Your Money virtual event on Oct.17 at 1 p.m.
Is Elon Musk physically strong?
Georges ST-Pierre reveals what he makes of Elon Musk – Speaking to the media ahead of UFC 290, the former welterweight and middleweight champion described their training session, stating: “It was a lot of fun. He’s very strong, physically very strong.
Much stronger than the average man. Very tough. I didn’t know that in the beginning, he has a judo background. It was an amazing experience. He’s someone that I have admired for years because of what he has done, his accomplishments, and for all the ideas that he stands for, and for me it was a dream come true to meet him in person.” With GSP in his camp, Elon Musk may get to know how to submit his opponent.
However, we are still in suspense regarding the status of the fight. Is it going to take place or not? nothing concrete on the Zuckerberg vs Musk fight can be gauged.
How did Elon Musk get so powerful
September 30, 2022 / 5:11 PM / MoneyWatch Tesla lawyers to question Elon Musk Tesla lawyers to question Elon Musk ahead of trial: CBS News Flash Sept.26, 2022 01:00 Tesla CEO Elon Musk, ranked as the world’s wealthiest person by both Forbes and the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, last year explained that the secret to his wealth is simple: “I own 20% of a company that became very valuable.” Musk, whose wealth is pegged at $240 billion by Bloomberg, hasn’t always been at the top of the heap. In early 2020, his wealth was just one-tenth of where it stands today, with his then-fortune of $25.6 billion placing him below the likes of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Musk’s remarkable jump in wealth is linked to his ownership stake in electric car maker Tesla, and to a lesser extent his holdings in ventures including Space X and Boring Company. Tesla, though, has been his primary vehicle for wealth creation, with the company’s stock surging more than 1,100% in the past five years as investors rewarded the company for its huge growth in vehicle sales. Tesla’s revenue jumped from $12 billion in 2017 to $54 billion in 2021. “I built these two companies and it was extremely difficult to build them,” Musk told the conservative satire site Babylon Bee in December 2021, referring to Tesla and Space X. “Rewarding, too, but massively difficult, and I didn’t sell the stock in the companies.” He added, “My sort of impression was that you shouldn’t take money off the table — or stock off the table — that a captain should go down with their ship.” Musk’s wealth has ebbed and flowed over the past few years. At his peak, Musk was worth $340 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That occurred in November 2021, when Tesla’s stock price hit a record high of $414.50 a share, according to FactSet. Since then, the car maker’s stock has dropped by about one-third.