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The Eight Most Common Traits of Successful People


Not every successful person gets successful the same way, but they all may still have some traits in common. Here are eight traits that most successful people have as determined by years of research.

Lecturer Richard St. John traveled around the world for ten years to conduct face-to-face interviews with successful people like Ben Cohen of Ben & Jerry's, Bill Gates, Arianna Huffington, James Cameron, Matt Groening, and even Dan Ackroyd. The list of successful, influential people he interviewed goes on and on. After analyzing everything he'd learned, he come up with these eight traits:

  1. Passion: Love what you do.

  2. Work: Really hard.

  3. Focus: On one thing, not everything.

  4. Push: And keep on pushing yourself.

  5. Ideas: Come up with some good ones.

  6. Improve: Keep improving yourself and what you do.

  7. Serve: Serve others something of value.

  8. Persist: Because there is no overnight success.

These are the traits that are great if you have them, but should be sought after if you don't. Success doesn't come easy, but when you know what you're aiming for, taking the shot is much simpler. To go more in-depth with the eight traits of successful people, check out this TED-Ed playlist.

8 traits of successful people - Richard St. John | YouTube