Telling children 'hard work gets you to the top' is simply a lie
theguardian.com
theguardian.com
Whereas hard work will work for many.
People tend to prefer working with others who are respectful, conscientious, considerate, understand the limits of their knowledge, don't make assumptions, don't take things personally, are curious, etc.
These traits won't make up for a complete lack of expertise, but in my experience they'll jettison the 'average' professional ahead of the 'expert' who lacks these characteristics.
'Hard work is an essential ingredient in success' is much more consistent with common beliefs, and it's more or less true.
Nobody is saying 'Just work hard and you will achieve the highest ranks of society'.
It's a 'lie' that anyone actually says that, hence the straw man.
The Guardian however, doesn't really want this to be true, and so like most ideological papers, they shift the goalposts of their supposed ideological opponents and misattribute the logic.
The flaw is right here:
"I have come to understand that the systems that underpin the top professions in Britain are set up to serve only a certain section of society: they’re readily identifiable by privileged backgrounds, particular schools and accents."
Yes, of course, British people, of all people know that.
They've known that for 1000 years.
But saying that 'the top corridors of power are hard to achieve' is a fundamentally different thing then (direct quote): “if you work hard you will get on”.
"If you work hard you will get on" is not "If you work hard you will achieve the top ranks of society".
Finally, there's a woeful lack of gratitude in the author's premise, that he, as an immigrant somehow deserves one of the most choice spots among 60 million residents 'because he worked hard'.
Ironically, as a 'extremely poor immigrant son of a single mother with 12 chilren and a person of colour' - the fact that he was able to receive considerably more and better education than his peers, and has had a very successful career and is a respected member of society actually demonstrates how relatively open, kind and tolerant the UK is at least overall.
He's almost a living, breathing contradiction of his own argument.
This misattribution is a daily, constant problem in the press (almost all of them) and it's a primary source of false information and social malaise.
The G has some great writers, I wish they would try harder.
I truly believe that selling your talents is super important to get to the top and staying there.
What exactly are people in the lower classes supposed to do? The author seems to imply that should just give up. Infuriatingly, the author states that they benefitted immensely from hard work and social mobility, but that will no longer work. Why does social mobility no longer work, what numbers back this up? The author provides nothing to back any of this up except some imagination exercises in the lives of the rich and poor.
To me the important question is not: will hard work make you the most successful but will hard work make you more successful.
Secondly, I dispute the thesis of the article (that education equality has become worse over time). The data doesn’t appear to concur with hat conclusion. The number of underprivileged kids at Oxford and Cambridge has increased significantly in the last decade. 68% of Oxford’s intake last year were state school students. When the author studied, the number might have been 45% at best (I don’t know his age).
The article is spot on: it is nearly impossible to succeed in your life with crapy education our "inner city" public schools offers.
The real lie is that there is only a single factor that leads to success, or, conversely, that there is only a single factor that holds one back from success.
These attractive deceptions are offered to people unwilling to think. For children, however, teaching them that hard work and perseverance are critical characteristics successful people have is absolutely valid and useful. Those habits are built between age 6 and 10. Then you start introducing the other textures of life. But there you see one of the other prerequisites: parents willing, and having the ability or circumstance, to spend time and effort to teach their children.