A mathematical model tells you how ambitious you should be. This is not what conventional wisdom says
A mathematical model has now figured out to what extent a person should be ambitious and contrary to conventional wisdom, it says ‘don’t look for the stars’. Researchers at the University of Wyoming, Stanford University and the University of Colorado-Boulder came up with a mathematical model to show that ambition is in the middle – above average but limited.“Conventional wisdom tells people not to compromise, but it also tells us not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” says lead author Kath Landgren, a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford’s Doerr School of Sustainability. “We wanted to see if the mathematics actually supports that intuition. It does, with some interesting twists.”
What is the ambition model or model ambition?
The researchers studied a model of searching for the best available strategy – where a strategy could represent anything from a job to a business idea, a romantic partner, a public policy or a political campaign.In their study ‘Optimal Ambivalence in Business, Politics and Life’, researchers proved that people get the best results when they use a satisfaction threshold that is above average but not over the moon. The limit should neither be too high nor too low. But if it is too much, it is even worse.“We hear this contradictory advice where, on the one hand, we don’t want to settle for what we have, but on the other hand, we don’t want to chase the unattainable and be disappointed,” said Matt Burgess, an economist at the University of Wyoming.“The key insight of our work is that generally, if you try to do better than average, but not infinitely well, you will be the best.”
Key findings of the ambition study
- A study led by Dr. Kath Landgren of Stanford’s Doerr School of Sustainability shows that being a perfectionist is detrimental to your success.
- Tech entrepreneurs should be less ambitious relative to their market average. Some companies and billionaires push mathematical averages to sky-high heights, far higher than is normal or realistic. If you set that increased average as your ambition, you set yourself up for immediate disappointment.
- Seeing highly successful people on social media drives change
decision making efficiency . The model shows that when you look at successful people and compare yourself to them, your ability to make smart decisions decreases.