As you've said luck is a very very important factor. As you get lucky, you tend to continue getting lucky because the more chips (capital) the cost of failure or unlucky runs is a lot lower than somebody about to be knocked out of the tournament.
Playing tight (risk averse) or loose (risk tolerant) or mania (risk indifferent) can yield very different outcomes and often professionals adjust their appetite for risk throughout the tournament.
Similarily, yes Steve Jobs got lucky and because he kept getting lucky he was in a position to make other bets without really suffering vs someone who bootstraps their business and exposed to the fluctuations of the market is going to have a tough time.
Nassim Taleb explains this better but to me the biggest shock when I started playing poker was, how much of an impact it's made no my perception of randomness and risk.