The Sludge of Success
Or how I developed a costly change blindness
“Memory is not a description of the objective past. Memory is a tool. Memory is the past’s guide to the future. If you remember that something bad happened, and you can figure out why, then you can try to avoid that bad thing happening again. That’s the purpose of memory. It’s not “to remember the past.” It’s to stop the same damn thing from happening over and over.”
- Jordan Peterson, 12 Rules For Life
Readers of this newsletter may be familiar with my series on career transitions and working identity. It’s the most coherent, sustained, and resonant theme that has emerged from my writing so far. The reflections in these posts were prompted by events in my life around March 2020, a chaotic, confusing time when the world first entered lockdown due to COVID-19 and switched to working from home. Crucially, for me, this was also a time when I went through a dramatic reorganisation of my team at work.
I’ve addressed this event before in the series, but am revisiting it in this post. Firstly, because it’s an event I’ll never forget: it marked a descent into chaos for me and seems to have been a pivotal moment in my psychological growth. But more importantly, as I’ve replayed it constantly in my mind, I’ve realised it contained a valuable lesson in detecting, anticipating, and adapting to change.
What did I learn from this episode?
Changes in your environment take place slowly…and then suddenly. Ignored over time, what might seem a minor aberration or disturbance can suddenly morph into a situation that completely subsumes your reality. The Butterfly Effect.
I learned that it’s important to spot anomalies that signal downstream changes in your environment, and respond accordingly. The ability to spot anomalies comes from being in maximal harmony and connection with your environment. Staying in connection means that you can adapt optimally to your environment as changes unfold within it. Stay rigid and fixed, and the environment will shift around you, leaving you in the lurch as the shift inevitably accelerates. Overreact and flail, and you’ll deplete valuable energy that could be better used to align with the changing circumstances. The optimal balance is to be found between stillness and action, between ego and surrender.
If these learnings seem obvious, it’s because they are. Putting them to use is the hard part. I wish I could simply take advantage of unearned wisdom. But before I learned all this at a deeper level, I had to painfully confront my past.
That reorganisation didn’t come out of the blue. It was set in motion by a seemingly innocuous event. The coming, bigger change was telegraphed over a span of months before it actually happened. What’s important is why I was caught off guard.
The story begins with a small change, one that took place months before the big change it signified.
I learned that my skip-level boss was leaving the firm.
This should have immediately registered in my mind as big news. It meant that a key career sponsor of mine no longer influenced the environment I occupied. My job itself - a unique role with a high degree of independence and autonomy - was made possible not in small part because of their authority and patronage. Their departure signalled that regime change was afoot. Someone new would step into the void at some point, and that could mean even more change downstream.
Why did this seemingly small change, as well as the larger, more important downstream changes it signified, not set the cogs of my mind churning?
It’s taken me a long time to find the answer, but when I did, it was easy:
Success.
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.”
- Bill Gates
What did my success up until that point look like?
A rapid rise from newbie with ‘bad press’ to ‘golden boy’ - my colleagues’ words. A high degree of autonomy and independence. Dependence on me from my team and beyond, which offered unlimited opportunities for collaboration. Recognition as a subject matter expert on my functional area. Being offered a platform to coach and train others. A high degree of visibility owing to the specific nature of the work. A seat at a meeting usually reserved for team leaders, afforded to me due to the singular nature of my role and work. The latitude to embark on creative projects that took time, a luxury in my industry. Constant validation from colleagues, seniors, and clients, and the world at large for the work I produced. In short, success beyond my wildest dreams unfolding in the unlikeliest of ways in a short span of time.
“Solid financial success is largely the result of skills, hard work, and wisdom. But wild success (in the far tail) is more likely to be the result of reckless betting, extreme luck, & the opposite of wisdom: folly.”
- Nassim Taleb
Narratives about success are terribly one-sided, incomplete, and misleading. At best, they illustrate the importance of intelligence, diligence, hard work, and persistence in achieving positive outcomes. But they don’t account much for the unique role of chance and circumstance. Considering what Nassim Taleb calls ‘alternative histories’ would add necessary, holistic context to a success story. What if so-and-so were born at a different time? What if a risky move failed? One needn’t look far - the power law of venture capital returns offers a glimpse into this reality. Yet, survivorship bias prevails.
Its close cousin is self-serving bias. Once successful, it’s easy to ascribe your own success entirely to your own efforts and methods, and then prescribe the same to others. We see this affliction exhibited visibly - but by no means exclusively - in some technocrats who, having experienced outlier success, extend unrealistic, hyper-rational frameworks (often conceived post-facto) in the belief that they can solve the perennial problems of the human condition overnight.
The late, great Charlie Munger warned about this:
“And of course self-serving bias, you want to get that out of yourself; thinking that what’s good for you is good for the wider civilisation and rationalising all these ridiculous conclusions based on the subconscious tendency to serve one’s self.”
Of course, I’m not exempt from folly. Once I experienced a hit of success, it was extremely easy for my ego to view my narrative as a sensible string of actions and I gleefully ate up the rational career models set out by my favourite online writers on the subject: it seemed I fit into nearly every one of them.
I couldn’t have been more blind. But this is the perilous sludge of success. The ego, having discovered a niche in the environment in which you thrive, does everything it can to capitalise on the new watering hole and preserve it for the undisturbed continuance of your present way of being. It also retrofits your narrative to that most seductive, tempting, but ultimately, untrue version: individual agency. It quickly forgets the stumbles, the chance discoveries, the co-operation you gave, and more importantly - the co-operation you received from your environment to achieve the outcomes you now lay claim to. It forgets that things exist in relationship.
What I’ve described in the above paragraph also mirrors Nietzsche’s story of The Master & His Emissary, chosen by Iain McGilchrist for his book of the same name to describe his hypothesis of the workings of the left (Emissary) and right (Master) brain hemispheres:
“There was once a wise spiritual master, who was the ruler of a small but prosperous domain, and who was known for his selfless devotion to his people. As his people flourished and grew in number, the bounds of this small domain spread; and with it the need to trust implicitly the emissaries he sent to ensure the safety of its ever more distant parts. It was not just that it was impossible for him personally to order all that needed to be dealt with: as he wisely saw, he needed to keep his distance from, and remain ignorant of, such concerns. And so he nurtured and trained carefully his emissaries, in order that they could be trusted. Eventually, however, his cleverest and most ambitious vizier, the one he most trusted to do his work, began to see himself as the master, and used his position to advance his own wealth and influence. He saw his master's temperance and forbearance as weakness, not wisdom, and on his missions on the master's behalf, adopted his mantle as his own - the emissary became contemptuous of his master. And so it came about that the master was usurped, the people were duped, the domain became a tyranny; and eventually it collapsed in ruins.”
- Iain McGilchrist, Introduction to The Master & His Emissary
“A strength in one situation is merely an entrenched piece of arrested development in another.”
- Venkatesh Rao, The Gervais Principle
Much like the vizier in the story, I drank my own Kool-Aid. I was so caught up in my own success and the false sense of self-importance that arose from it, that it simply didn’t occur to me that the departure of a career sponsor would have a significant bearing on my future. Blinded by my own name in lights, my obliviousness to the obvious - the early, slow rumblings of change - cost me a future I wished for at the time.
As I learned of an incoming new boss, and that my team would undergo a significant reorg, my antennae didn’t perk up. It’s not that I didn’t have information - in fact, I had early access to much of what was coming down the pike. I just wasn’t paying the right kind of attention. I was so invested in my current circumstances that even imagining a change was difficult, if not impossible. I assumed, arrogantly, that my achievements and track record would be sufficient to convince whoever it was that came in that I could secure the growth and position I wanted - that I was owed - under the new regime. That…didn't turn out to be the case.
Had I merely thought to contemplate a worst-case scenario, I might have saved myself some suffering. Had I done some homework, I could have tried to find out more about the incoming boss and his character. I might have tailored my approach better after they derailed an initial conversation about my future. Instead, I took umbrage at how that interaction went, and didn’t pursue further engagement. I could have conferred with other colleagues, learned more about what one might do in such a situation and how to navigate. Instead, I found myself withdrawing co-operation - at a time when it was most crucial to extend it to my present environment - and the next couple of years unfolded painfully for me.
If you think I’m being hard on myself, I am. I don’t doubt that the growth I wished for did not materialise at least in part due to managerial neglect. Being on a company-sponsored work visa also meant I had no leverage at the time. Not being a resident with free mobility in the labour market meant that I couldn’t simply get another job. And being thrust into an unprecedented pandemic with all the uncertainty accompanying it didn’t help: I was on the cusp of receiving a new job offer when the world went into lockdown and it got pulled. So yes, there were certainly strong limitations on the range of possible actions I could take. But if our cherished notion of individual agency means anything, it must apply well beyond buttressing our claims to success. The point here is to take ownership of what was within my control. It’s to reflect on my role in how events unfolded and my maneuvering of the situation I was presented. Of course, this is not to say that I can undo the course of action I took or that I regret it entirely. But weighing the ‘alternative histories’ is important here, given that we’re playing with probabilities all the time. If I don’t consider the alternatives, I’ll be less prepared for what Ray Dalio calls “another one of those” - a future situation that rhymes with what I experienced above.
“I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long.”
- Steve Jobs
How can we better navigate the pitfalls of success?
My answers are to acknowledge it, share it, pay it forward, and move on (to my credit, I also did those things). Enjoy it while it lasts, but don’t dwell. Nobody likes the aura of the bitter has-been who thinks their one, glorious minute in the limelight was somehow a passport to eternal adulation.
Success can feel surprisingly hollow.
One of the most staggering memories in my mind is of the day I attended the ceremony for an award I was nominated for. I didn't win. Watching the winner go up and receive their prize took all of ten seconds. There was a quick announcement, a short burst of applause, the perfunctory handshake and photograph, and it was…over. The winner returned to their seat. No speech, no extended discussion of their work or the journey they’d taken to get there. The ceremony moved on, and the venue cleared out abruptly as the event ended.
It all felt rather…empty.
Years later, as I read this poignant story of Matt Damon’s feelings after winning his first Oscar, I breathed a sigh of relief. How glad am I now that I didn’t win that day. As ‘good’ as that may have been for my CV, I’m not sure I’d have processed such an experience in a way that would actually reap benefits for my career. It would have only served to inflate my already swollen ego. After that, I may have fallen even harder, and it would have become even harder to untangle what
rightly calls “identity sludge”.I’ve learned to be grateful for when life cuts me down to size. And it seems I’m learning:
“It’s hard to admit that much of my earlier successes were predicated on nurturing, kind environments, patient, understanding, and mature bosses, co-operative colleagues, and the affordances of relative independence and autonomy. In an environment that didn’t allow me these affordances, the tide ran out quickly on me and my personal narrative. Realising that my past success was connected with everything else and is not my own, allows for a degree of grace I haven’t experienced before.”
- Myself in Career transitions & working identity pt. 2
Recommendations:
Read: Who Moved My Cheese by Dr. Spencer Johnson. This tiny book - which you can finish in under a couple of hours, is a short, but powerful story about two mice in search of cheese, which represents happiness and success. Why read? Because I believe stories about change are more powerful than theories about it. The ultimate validation of this recommendation comes from a friend - who barely reads - but read it and said it was ‘damn good’.
introduced me to the next two recommendations. They were shared in a years-long conversation I’ve had with him about meaning-making from work. He also runs a group called Links, on which he shares curated content, and I’m pleased to have seen it double its membership over the past few days.
My friendRead: The Gervais Principle by
Rao’s interpretation of The Office as a “fully realised theory of management” struck a deep chord as I navigated said reorg. His exposition of the dark side of positive psychology helped me tremendously and really forms the backbone of what I’m trying to convey in this piece:
“Your development is arrested by your strengths, not your weaknesses.
Arrested-development behavior is caused by a strength-based addiction.”
Read: The Curse of Culture by Ben Thompson
This piece talks about the same phenomenon I tried to detail in my story, but for companies. Success can ossify an organisation’s cultural imperatives - to its own detriment.“The rigidity of both [Apple and Google] is the manifestation of the disease that affects every great company: the assurance that what worked before will work eternally into the future, even if circumstances have changed. What makes companies great is inevitably what makes companies fail, whenever that day comes.”
Read/Watch/Listen: Intimations of A New Worldview by
My friend
introduced me to Brett’s incredibly gripping YouTube series, and it does what the title says. If you’re short on time to read or watch, listen to their joint podcast with here. Relevant to my story above is Brett’s description of ‘fixed-point’ attractors - ‘habitual policies and homeostatic setpoints’ - which correspond to the comfort I’d derived from my success and my inability to adapt to my changing environment.“The first line about being prepared to disrupt our own fixed-point attractors is essentially saying that we must become comfortable with uncertainty and chaos. Much of psychopathology consists of people getting stuck in ruts (i.e., fixed patterns of behavior) of one kind or another. This can refer to addictions, bad relationships, or a variety of bad habits.
Changing one’s way of life is always accompanied by uncertainty and anxiety. It is all-too-often the avoidance of this anxiety that causes people to get stuck in these various ruts.”
My writing on career has stemmed both from my own process, but reinforced (carefully, this time) by the feedback I have received. I’m grateful to my friends for their generosity: for giving me their time, energy, attention, turning me on to great content, and sharing my writing on to their audiences. Knowing that what I share resonates - in whatever small way - helps bring me back to the keyboard.
Thank you for reading!
Such a good reflection on your own "miss"-predictions; or the lack of them.
People seem to generally forget how much randomness matters in terms of success. There is a book which title I have forgotten and I have been searching for it for years, but it highlights several success of "pre-influencer"-age internet celebrities.
They all had one thing in common:
It was some random share, connection or exposure to the public through someone else that magnified their reach so much that they literally could contribute most of their success to that moment.
I was not aware that some of the "tech"-leaders of the past, or at least their more know personalities, have a somewhat more sober attitude towards successful outcomes - fully not aware of that, so thank you for digging that out.
If I may add here, I believe this is also somewhat of problem in terms of spiritual wellbeing. We often just take life in as it is, and especially interpret our own identity, worth and purpose, equal to our work related successes. Thus, it had to be all us, right?
Impressive Ritvik that you are now able to see all these "alternatives" that you could have engaged with - all of them some sort of reality where you likely have not bound your spiritual wellbeing and capacity directly and exclusively to that work.