Being Successful Isn’t About IQ

I try not to worry too much about success and failure.  I believe if I do what I’m interested in and passionate about, success will follow.

Being that I had never gone to school in English, never written a paper, or read a whole book in English, I always felt super behind in college. But to be in this incredibly vibrant intellectual place, I knew this was the one opportunity I would have access to this stuff, so my mentality was to drink it all up, and be ok with not getting straight A’s.

I remember when I showed up at Princeton I became really intimidated and thought, “Holy shit, here are all these people who are so brilliant. How can I compete?” Then I realized that there are plenty of smart people in the world, so just being really smart is never going to be the only driving factor for success. What matters is if you really care about something and are relentless about making it happen. Then you will be better at that thing than other people. The difference that makes people successful isn’t about another IQ point.

Male Bias in the Investment Industry

Statistics show that people are more likely to encourage boys to look at the stock market than girls. Encouraging a child towards a specific field influences their young adult decisions. Add to that, all the great investors in the news have been men.

Many women perceive investment as being heavily about math, and some say reading charts doesn’t come naturally to them. Math and charts is a piece of what we do, but not the most important piece. There are many facets to the qualifications necessary to perform a job in investment research. However, research shows that if a woman thinks she can’t satisfy them all, they’re unlikely to apply. Men don’t seem to worry about that. Even if they know they are missing some of the qualifications, they’ll apply anyway and figure it out on the job. Women should do the same.

When I joined Bridgewater, I was the only woman in the investment department. At the time, women’s issues were not on my radar, so I didn’t think much about it. But when I watched videos of myself in big investment meetings, I realized I was the only professional woman in a room full of about 45 men. I hadn’t realized the extremity of it. I never felt oppressed, I loved my job, but I realized the lack of women in the investment field had to change.

Mentors and Friendships

I’ve always had a strong relationship with women at Bridgewater. Early on when there weren’t other women in research, I made friends with women in other roles. I needed those women for friends and mentorship, and I can’t imagine my job without that.

People make the mistake of thinking they need to find one mentor who will do everything for them. I’ve always had a range of mentors, both men and women, each with a different gift or strength. I think that’s important.

Growing up my parents were huge role models for me. They are both professors. My mom is very much a lone researcher who gets up in the middle of the night and writes papers. My dad loves teaching and helping students with their careers. They officially have the same job, but they choose to play very different roles within that context which showed me that there is a wide range of ways to have an impact on the world and really love what you’re doing.

Practice Leads to Confidence

When I first started seeing clients I felt intimidated presenting to a large group of older white men. The feedback I got was, “You’re making yourself seem smaller than you are; you know more than is coming across; you know a lot and you’re more senior than the men you’re presenting to, but you come across as more junior.” I was intimidated, so I would make myself small and I wouldn’t be myself. I was giving the clients a mistaken impression.

I did mock client meetings to practice. No matter how busy I was, I made sure to get in at least one practice a week. I got through the problem quickly because I kept practicing. I also had to give myself pep talks, telling myself, “This strategist doesn’t know more than I do, he’s not in a better place to answer this question than I am, I have no reason to feel nervous.”

In any job, you have to know that things will be hard sometimes and you’ll fail, but you have to keep doing it. It’s too easy to stick to the stuff that you’re already really good at. It’s important to learn and grow and stretch.