high floor, no ceiling

In systems of elite performance, the success of the system is measured by the most successful outputs. We don’t need ten thousand great presidents, or hundreds of thousands of Navy Seals, or millions of doctors. We only need a few, and often, we only need one. 

In our own lives, finding a job, a house, or a romantic partner are all examples of elite performance systems. We really only need one really good answer to be happy. 

But not all of life works like that—while most of us are perfectly content to let other people become Navy Seals, all of us want to find some kind of job. Want some level of education. Need a reasonable access to food, water, and the occasional margarita—just the basics. 

Those systems play by a different rule, where the outliers no longer matter. The measure of success of a system we all need is how well it serves the people who are least capable of navigating it. 

Could you imagine a world where the person graduating with the lowest GPA was the one who gave the graduation speech?

Maybe that’s the exact world we should imagine.

Thank you. Let’s have a great day.