[This is Julia, the OC] In some ways, this article is a response to this sentiment. It's true that luck is an important factor, but you can make your own luck through hard work. Being successful with startups is not like winning the lottery, because lottery winners just sit around holding a ticket. Startup founders are constantly working to attract more luck - or lightning - to themselves.
I appreciate the sentiment of 'making your own luck', and while I think that it is true to a certain extent, there are also the opposite cases.
Let's look at one totally random example off the top of my head - Grumpy Cat. Now, GC's owners basically sat there while the owner's brother I believe, posted the cat's picture on social media, which turned into a storm that netted GC's owners multi millions of dollars in marketing deals. Sure there was probably some hard work after the fact in managing those deals, but initially, it was just pure dumb luck of the cat's picture being posted in the right place at the right time to ignite the response of the world. Tons of other cat pictures go unnoticed every day.
I had a client many years ago - a nice chap, but not what I would call a good businessman. He had trouble stringing a coherent sentence together, and had a bad drinking and gambling problem. Only he happened to start an aboriginal art retail business right when 'Crocodile Dundee' came out and Australian Aboriginal Art was the big thing. He basically had a $1M annual turnover business overnight, and had no clue how to manage it. In fact, we were called in to run an audit because some of his employees were embezzling truckloads of money from him right under his nose. He just lucked into a thriving business but not due to any sort of acumen or hard work. Next door to him there was an auto mechanic business I also worked with whose owner (who was in a wheelchair BTW) worked 80+ hours per week to struggle to put food on his family's table. I found it hard to look at these two businesses literally running side by side, and say that it was anything but dumb luck that separated them, regardless of hard work.
My understanding actually is that the ridiculous Grumpy Cat thing was actually a pretty purposeful and managed marketing campaign to build a minor meme into a brand. I believe it might actually be an example that proves the opposite point from what you're trying to make here.
these are not startups though and you can't compare them to a startup.
sure, luck is a factor in everything but it's not a make or break factor in startups. in startups you make your own luck. you work hard, suffer the small wins and losses, until you get yourself in the right place at the right time. some people find that opportunity early, some later but both get there because they worked at it. even Uber founders had to work hard for it. and don't even get me started on Airbnb's founders
[Julia again] Y'all should read the article! These examples of "lightning striking" absolutely happens to people that don't work hard for it. But knowing and appreciating the role of chance doesn't mean that hard work doesn't pay off, because hard work can make you more likely to experience a stroke of luck.
The question is the extent to which that is true, and whether or not it's the primary factor involved in a success.
Work hard => success is a simplistic and misleading mythology, not an evidence-based reality. It also leads to toxic relationships with workers, because if a founder or manager believes that more hours = success they'll make some very stupid business decisions and trash the quality of life of some of their employees for no good reason.
If hard work (how is that measured?) isn't a primary factor - and plenty of research suggests it isn't - then the realistic way for founders to increase their chances of success is to understand that factors that actually contribute the most, and maximise those.
