They say it’s lonely at the top, but that’s not correct.
It’s warlike at the top.
In fact many leaders, both admirable and despicable, agree on this one specific fact. Every day, going to work – has a war like quality to it.
Of course, this is not to diminish or downplay the horror that is war. I’m not claiming here that being a corporate executive is somewhat equal to serving in the military. Far from it…
Real war, and real service, is something completely different and demands nothing but solemn respect.
Here, I’m only trying to point to the fact that you experience something hectic, confrontational and dangerous as you climb the chaos-ladder of modern business.
This is the reality of executive as well as entrepreneurial life. We get up every single morning and go to our version of a symbolic “war”….
Who Is Having This Symbolic “War”
We are (symbolically) at war with the collective of incompetent, unwilling and ignorant people who make up the majority of the population.
And that’s not an opinion, that’s a technical fact**
(Sidenote: Just read any Gallup poll on workplace performance or look into the research of Derek de Solla Price – he invented a field called “scientometrics” and proved that only a tiny fraction of the people in any organisation create the vast majority of value.)
We are at war with incompetence.
And the war doesn’t stop there… We are also at war with competitors, suppliers, vendors, stakeholders – anyone and everyone you can imagine – who lacks our vital urgency to produce results. People lacking this urgency, constantly cause us friction, slow us down, hinder our performance, and frustrate our efforts.
Not to mention all the government bureaucrats who are trying to justify their salaries, or any of the no good critics who couldn’t assemble an IKEA chair to save their life… Who are merely crying for attention.
We are at war with incompetence…
At times, this war is even with ourselves… With our own evolutionary baggage that wants us to stay invisible and left alone, our poor habits from childhood that taint our consciousness because we grew up in a schooling system that was designed to manufacture obedient drones, and even our self-sabotaging behaviors that stem from what Freud called the “death instinct”.
Make no mistake! A high-value professional’s life is the life of a warrior, and losing is not an option. If you can’t handle all that relentless confrontation, you aren’t ready for the role.
How Can You Know If You’re Ready For This War?
Today, I am going to give you the single biggest mindset you need to embrace, if you want to have high-value roles and get paid obnoxiously large salaries.
That big mindset has to do with understanding “value”.
Here we go:
Value comes first. Value dictates everything.
You must create and control value to win our war.
In fact, your control over the creation of value (and your tolerance for risk) entitles you to the lion’s share of the profits in any business dealing.
That’s how it works. That’s how it has always worked. That’s how it will always work.
Value is the ONLY rule.
Let me explain with an example…
I remember having a stellar interview with a fairly large company in LA who had flown me across the country for a few hours of talks. At the end of the interview, it was clear that they wanted to give me the job and we started talking numbers.
Of course, like everything else I do in business communication, I have a planned script for that… I’m never caught answering any question for the first time… I’m never caught with an unexpected question… Preparation is the way to victory.
This time, my interviewer asked “how much I wanted”. I wrote down a number for him (for reasons I might tell you someday). He looked at my number with a gasp that betrayed his shock and amusement. And told me, “That’s more than double what I had in mind! Even if I wanted to give you that, it’s not in our budget. We need to meet somewhere reasonable”…
To which I replied something along the lines of “the profits I’m planning for you are not in your forecast either”. (By the way – please don’t use this line. If you do, you’ll probably get laughed out of the interview… I was feeling quite frisky, I had prepared him for such an outlandish statement over the past two hours, and it made sense in that context)
Long story short… Yes… He did give me the number I was asking for.
Of course, the crucial question is “WHY?”…
Why did he break his budget to meet an outlandish offer with an outlandish character?
Why did he go out of his way to make room for mine?
How This War is Won
You see… Salaries are actually determined in a certain logical, market driven way. But, unfortunately, the vast majority of employees have no idea about how this process works.
Most people think that the longer you’ve been doing a job, or the more “senior” you are, the more you should be paid for it. And from teachers unions to corporate pay ladders, our business culture reinforces this fallacy.
But the reality is far, FAR different. And those of us who operate outside of this fake paradigm… Those who not only operate in the real world of free markets, but who also happen to win in that free market – those who win by creating and controlling value – get treated to outlandish rewards.
Think of it this way: Let’s say you tighten a bolt on a widget all day long, and your labor is worth $10.
How can it suddenly be worth $30, just because you’ve been sitting there and tightening that bolt on the widget for 20 years? Or because it now costs you more money to make ends meet.
Neither needs nor seniority entitle you to more money.
Why should it? You haven’t added any additional value! You haven’t created anything of value, or managed to control the creation of anything of value.
You’re still operating in the domain of the initial agreement.
Did you tighten the bolt 3 times faster, facilitating the production of three times the widgets?
Did you tighten the bolt 3 times better, such that the flaws in the widgets were drastically reduced?
If you did any of that, you would deserve a boost in your pay. But just doing the same job at the same level of performance for a longer duration doesn’t add more value to anything, and therefore, doesn’t entitle you to anything.
Value comes first. Value comes before pay.
Only If You Bow To Value, Will Others Bow To Your Wishes – And Do Willingly So
Here’s the thing..
Like it or not, businesses have to grapple with the fact that the cost of an employee is determined by the market conditions of supply and demand, and the value they produce… Sure, you are perfectly justified to get angry at the morons who ruin our markets by outsourcing, debasing our currency, and instituting idiotic industrial policy.
But none of that changes the reality at hand…
Employees have it in their head that they should get raises every year, because that’s just the way it is and law says so.
Of course, employers aren’t stupid. And they counterbalance this cultural expectation with salary norms, and obtuse formulas for calculating compensation packages. Then they hide it inside complex language that confuses most rank-and-file workers into forgetting the single, insurmountable fact, that at the end of the day – what you get paid is what you can get away with being paid.
And the reason some of us can get away with more is because we create and control more value. Period.
Now… If you think like an employee, you are at the mercy of your employer and the rules they have concocted in their HR departments. And these rules are specifically engineered, and carefully communicated in a way that commodotizes your efforts.
The brilliance of it is that, while doing all this, they simultaneously make you feel like you are getting a fair, equitable deal that you should be happy with. Or at least, a deal you shouldn’t revolt over.
It’s literally a corporate psi-op.
Of course, some of us see through this charade, reject this fake paradigm, and play by our own rules instead. And those rules happen to be the rules of value. It is the rules of the market.
I don’t get paid what HR dictates based on my years of experience or the authoritativeness of my title. I get paid what I can extract from the market, in exchange for the value I create and control.
When you embrace this mindset, all the HR rules and cultural norms disappear.
But this is a double edged sword…
If you want an unfairly large wage, and if you want to be employed in a way that is the highest and best use of your time; you have to be willing to take a good look at yourself, and then, fully objectify the value you create and control.
What would you pay yourself? What could you get away with paying yourself?
This analysis is not comfortable. Sometimes, it’s very uncomfortable.
But it’s extremely rewarding.
Your choice…
A white-collar 9 to 5 employee life with an average salary is not a bad life. And by no means I’m diminishing their choices; some people have other relevant priorities in life like family, free time, work life balance or even video games.
Furthermore, compared to the peasants of Europe or the serfs of the Soviets, it’s an easy, comfortable and even entertaining life to be mediocre wagie in the corporate world. (You may no longer be able to afford a mortgage, or afford getting married. But at least, you won’t starve… Or you likely won’t starve.)
Regardless, for some of us this ordinary wagie approach to life is not even an option. Sure, we may have corporate jobs or politically correct offices furnished by HR… But… We don’t play by their rules.
Why? Well… Simply put, it’s because we are not peasants. Some of us have that irate, easily agitated, ravenously hungry – warrior blood.
And the nature of this blood to boil!
If you are one of us… If you want more… If you’re willing to demand more. You need to stop playing their game, and learn how to play our game.
You need to put value first. You need to learn how to create and control value in the modern corporate setting which is designed to do the exact opposite – it’s designed to alienate your value in exchange for a wage.
Take control of the value you create, take control of your life.
We can show you how…