Being able to keep going, even when times are difficult, is critical to building personal wealth. Perseverance is characteristic of ultra-wealthy entrepreneurs. Without question, many factors are essential to building significant personal wealth. Talent—your innate abilities—certainly play a factor. Also, being lucky can make a major difference in your net worth. Still, perseverance tends to be essential.
There is a strong reason for perseverance being so tightly tied to building significant personal wealth. Rarely are entrepreneurial endeavors an unhindered path to affluence. Just about all ultra-wealthy entrepreneurs fail—to some degree—along the way. Sometimes these failures are due to poor business decisions. Many times they are due to factors beyond an entrepreneur’s control such as economic and political crises.
What does this mean? For ultra-wealthy entrepreneurs, failure is not a possibility; it is an inevitability. However, a striking difference between ultra-wealthy entrepreneurs and their less successful peers is perseverance.
The Importance Of Goals
Core to perseverance is meaningful goals. Ultra-wealthy entrepreneurs regularly have hard-to-reach business and financial goals. But, such goals are not enough. They also have conceptualized viable ways to attain their goals. The ultra-wealthy are passionate about reaching their hard-to-reach business and financial goals.
For the ultra-wealthy, their goals instill in them an intense sense of purpose. What is very telling is that for the majority of the ultra-wealthy their sense of purpose exceeds making money. Very often, their sense of purpose includes building a world-class business as well as positively impacting the world.
In many cases, the ultra-wealthy reset their business and financial goals as they are close to achieving them. They reset their goals higher. Many who have built significant enterprises and reaped considerable economic rewards for doing so believe they are not quite good enough and what they have achieved is not quite good enough. They are chasing a dream that is unlikely to materialize. In effect, they are satisfied with being unsatisfied as they strive to improve and do more.
The Importance Of Self-Efficacy
Essential for the ultra-wealthy to persevere is their high level of self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is the belief a person has that he or she can be very successful in specific situations. Self-efficacy impacts every entrepreneur’s business activities, from the effort they exert to the level of commitment to finish when confronted with obstacles to what goals people set for themselves. Simply put: It’s the “I can” or “I cannot” belief.
The ultra-wealthy recognize that they are good at certain tasks and functions, but not all tasks and functions. Consequently, they concentrate their efforts on those activities where they are especially proficient. They do the things they do well and delegate the rest.
The ultra-wealthy because they possess high levels of self-efficacy are good at persevering because they know that there is an excellent chance they will end up very successful provided they continue forwards. They will often immerse themselves in critical aspects of their business lives resulting in them developing an insightful understanding that often results in creative solutions to obstacles.
Another benefit of high self-efficacy is being able to bounce back from hindrances and serious setbacks relatively quickly. The ultra-wealthy realize their strengths and weaknesses. When a business deal is lost, for example, they grasp that this outcome can and will happen At the same time, they do not let it slow them down and certainly not let it derail them. They persevere moving on to the next opportunity.
RUSS ALAN PRINCE is the Executive Director of Private Wealth magazine (pw-mag.com) and Chief Content Officer for High-Net-Worth Genius (hnwgenius.com). He consults with family offices, the wealthy, fast-tracking entrepreneurs, and select professionals.