The issue of wealth, how it is manufactured, how it is managed and how it is transmitted, has preoccupied man since the advent of time. People dream of wealth. Nations go to war over it. Empires collapse because of it. In ancient or ancient times, war and looting were the easiest ways to accumulate wealth. Think of Genghis Khan as a personification of this bygone and forgotten age. Today, wealth is generated by mastering critical disciplines, three of which are fundamental. Master them and you are on your way to riches. If you neglect them, your wealth will be fleeting at best or you will return to misery over time at worst.
Some of the richest people on our planet today, both dead and alive, are personifications of these disciplines. According to Forbes magazine, there are 1,826 billionaires in the world and the top 500 control 67% of the wealth. In no particular order, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Carlos Slim, Mark Zuckerberg, Aliko Dangote, Jack Ma, Carl Icahn, and George Soros, all billionaires in their own right, have mastered these three disciplines. Here they are:
1. They see the big picture
This is sometimes called trend detection. Very few people on earth master this discipline and the few who do are all super rich. Take the case of Aliko Dangote, whose wealth is greater than that of Richard Branson and Donald Trump combined, nothing more than mastery of the three disciplines has propelled him to the position of the 67th richest person on the planet. It might have ranked higher if it weren’t for the dire drop in oil prices and the resulting adverse movement in the exchange rate against the Naira. Being from one of the poorest countries in the world with a per capita income of $ 3,000, relative to roughly $ 54,000 for the US, $ 63,000 for the UAE, and $ 84,000 for Switzerland, has not come between him and this achievement. As it did? The vision of the big picture dominated. Realizing the huge population and poverty of Nigeria, he started investing in staples like flour, cement, sugar and salt, and the rest, as the saying goes, is history.
The same can be said for Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Tony Elumelu, to name a few. When the microcomputer revolution was brewing, Gates and Jobs spent endless hours dominating the emerging industry, including programming and coding. In Gates’ case, it was “so intense” that some of his friends ditched him. Back in Nigeria, while financial services or the banking industry were being deregulated, Tony Elumelu moved heaven and earth to obtain a banking license. To make sure he didn’t miss out, he bought a dead bank, Crystal Bank for Africa, and resurrected it. Today Tony is one of the 50 richest people in Africa. Seeing the big picture is one of the most important disciplines you must master to alter your destiny. Steve Jobs calls this discipline, connecting the dots. Right now, a new industry is brewing, IoT (Internet of Things), which Bill Gates has predicted will be larger than the combination of computers and the Internet and 99.99% of the people on the planet have not even heard of it. Do you want to be very rich? Start connecting the dots.
2. They are competitive
When it comes to competitiveness, the ultra-rich have no rivals. Sometimes people here say that the ultra-rich are “bad”, because they will trade every penny. They never leave a hundred on the table. That’s why Apple would spend millions suing Samsung for copyright infringement, Microsoft would control the entire world to remove counterfeit software, and Richard Branson would vow never to do business with the Nigerian government again for breaking a contract.
The ultra-rich employ the best lawyers, accountants, and economists to guide and advise them on their every move before taking any action. When it comes to competitiveness, among billionaires, Donald Trump is unrivaled. Bill Zanker, the founder of The Learning Annex, once offered Trump $ 10,000 to appear on his platform and Trump wouldn’t budge until Zanker upped the ante to $ 100,000, and as Zanker mentioned in Think Big and Kick Ass, a co-author With Donald Trump, the deal took their business to a whole new level. If you want to be very rich, you must master competitiveness. Competitiveness is not just about negotiation, it is the ability to be decisive and engage in mental leaps of imagination to focus on goals.
3. They are crafty
This is the final discipline that the ultra-rich master must ensure that his wealth endures and is passed on to the next generation. If you look at the list of the richest people, you will meet at least four billionaires from the Sam Walton clan. Sam Walton was the founder of Wal-Mart, the world’s largest supermarket chain. Forbes named him America’s Richest Man in 1985. Despite his wealth, he drove a Ford pickup and never hired a driver. Also, despite being the richest man in the world, Bill Gates does not own a superyacht. Apple’s Steve Jobs lived in a modest house in Palo Alto on half an acre of land. Despite his wealth, Warren Buffet still goes to work every day even at 85 years old. Richard Branson hardly wears expensive suits. His entire approach underscores the discipline of being crafty. Compare these billionaires to NBA headlines, boxers, and rock stars and you’ll soon understand why the average boxer retires in misery despite having made millions at age twenty-four. Floyd Mayweather, whose wealth is estimated at $ 300 million, recently told ESPN that he bought cars estimated at $ 15 million. That’s not all, Josh Towbin of Towbin Motorcars told USA Today’s Martin Rogers that his dealership has sold Mayweather “more than 100 cars” in a span of 18 years. According to Towbin, Mayweather’s car fleet includes 16 Rolls Royces. If you want your wealth to last, be smart. Being cunning is not the same as being greedy, it is about deploying your wealth in the most strategic way possible to survive you.
When writing about wealth, authors mix cause and effect. The authors emphasize actions that lead to wealth or characteristics of the wealthy, such as taking risks, being action-oriented, and delaying gratification, while neglecting the internal anchors or disciplines that make wealth durable. I dare say that taking risks will not only ruin you, but guarantee your failure. The ultra-rich avoid risk like the plague. The reengineer risks, as Jay Abraham advises, to turn the tables in his favor. What about being action oriented? This does not guarantee anything. What if you are taking action in the wrong direction? What about delayed gratification, which behavioral scientists have elevated to the status of a mantra? This is also pure myth. You can deny yourself the good things in life until your kingdom comes and still end up in misery if you don’t master the three main disciplines in combination, the main of which is seeing the big picture.
