There really is no limit to how valuable you can become.And it hinges on you cracking what x is.
All of us think we are worth more than we earn.
All of us think we deserve a promotion.
All of us believe that people don’t really understand our abilities.
All of the above are partially true.
But most of us aren’t in possession of precise road maps that help us become more valuable.
That’s because our idea of becoming more valuable is skewed.
What does it mean to be 10 times more valuable, to add 20 times more value, to ask someone to pay you thrice your current salary?
Many times, we see people attempt to create value and make the value of x go up by doing more.
So working ten times harder (or 10x harder) means working 10 hours, or 100 hours, more.
Or adding 50 needless slides more to the presentation to make it look like a lot of effort has gone in,
Or by having 5 senior people at the presentation who add negligible value to the scheme of things.
On the other hand, there are many tangible ways to add value.
Add a coat of paint and you can quote more for a house you want to sell or rent.
If a highway or a hospital comes up in close proximity to a neighborhood, the value of houses in the area goes up.
A string of good scores can help a player secure a plum deal at the next player auction.
A massive hit enables an actress to charge five times her current rate for a commercial endorsement.
This means x is variable.
In common parlance, this is known as the X factor, the mysterious element that helps someone stand out from the crowd, making them more valuable. It’s almost like a superpower.
There really is no limit to how valuable you can become.
And it hinges on you cracking what x is.
x can mean many things.
For a free-kick specialist, their ability to convert free kicks is the x they need to work on.
For a political strategist, their ability to create campaigns that help their candidate win is what enables their x to go up.
For a chef, their ability to create a dining experience like no other with their preparations is their x.
x, unfortunately, can also be negative.
“She spreads negativity faster than a virus”
“Think twice before working under that person”
Arriving at that x (the positive kind) takes time, guts, intuition, grit.
A player doesn’t go up to the coach and ask to be picked on the basis of how many hours they have practiced.
An organization doesn’t go to a prospective client and ask them to award them the business on the basis of the number of slides in the powerpoint presentation.
All of this means increasing the value of x involves:
a) finding something to be very good at
b) finding ways to get very good at that something
c) curating what you have to offer in such a manner that people seek you out for that
d) sustaining that x, whatever it is, with practice and diligence
e) Spending time on getting better insights
When you become 10, 20 or 100 times more valuable, you can’t always put a number to it.
When an ad says 5x more times of something, what exactly do they mean? In most cases, it makes absolutely no sense.
Most times, we assume people are born with an X factor, that it fell into their lap without any effort from their side. That they were born superheroes or heroines.
We also sometimes mistake an X factor for genius, a unique talent, something that is the prerogative only of a chosen few.
Understanding that you can increase the value of x, not through hustle, sucking up, putting others down or doing stupidly adding hours and slides but rather, through hard work and effort, sets you free to go about doing that instead of taking short-cuts to make yourself look more valuable.
