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The major differences between successful and unsuccessful people

Here’s six mantras to follow in order to make more of a success of your career.

LAST YEAR, DAVE Kerpenauthor and chief executive of Likeable Local, received a postcard that illustrated the traits and behaviors of successful and unsuccessful people.

The card came from fellow Entrepreneurs Organisation member Andy Bailey, the chief executive of Petra Coach. Although the two CEOs have never met, Kerpen said in a 2014 LinkedIn post that the postcard has had a profound effect on him, “reinforcing values I believe in and reminding me on a daily basis of the attitudes and habits that I know I need to embrace in order to become successful.”

The postcard, shown below, points out 16 big differences between successful and unsuccessful people.

successful Dave Kerpen Dave Kerpen

Click here to view a larger image

Here are six of our favorites:

1. Successful people embrace change. Unsuccessful people fear it. ”Embracing change is one of the hardest things a person can do,” Kerpen says. With the world moving fast and technology accelerating at a rapid speed, it’s imperative that we embrace these changes and adapt, rather than fear them, deny then, or hide from them, he says. Successful people are able to do just that.

2. Successful people talk about ideas. Unsuccessful people talk about people. Instead of gossiping about people — which gets you nowhere — successful people discuss ideas. “Sharing ideas with others will only make them better,” Kerpen says.

3. Successful people accept responsibility for their failures. Unsuccessful people blame others. Truly successful leaders and businesspeople experience both ups and downs in their lives and careers. But they always accept responsibility for their failures. Kerpen says blaming others solves nothing. “It just puts other people down and absolutely no good comes from it.”

4. Successful people give others all the credit for their victories. Unsuccessful people take all the credit from others. Letting people have their moments to shine motivates them to work harder, and, consequently, makes you look better as a leader or teammate.

5. Successful people want others to succeed. Unsuccessful people secretly hope others fail. ”When you’re in an organisation with a group of people, in order to be successful, you all have to be successful,” Kerpen explains. That’s why the most successful people don’t wish for their demise; they want to see their co-workers succeed and grow.

6. Successful people continuously learn. Unsuccessful people fly by the seat of their pants. The only way to grow as a person, professional, and leader is to never stop learning. “You can be a step above your competition and become more flexible because you know more,” Kerpen writes. “If you just fly by the seat of your pants, you could be passing up opportunities that prevent you from learning (and growing!).”

Other major differences: Successful people exude joy, share data and information, and read every day, while unsuccessful people exude anger, hoard data and information, and watch TV every day.

Check out the full LinkedIn post here

- Jacquelyn Smith

Read: Google is making a big move to help treat diabetes

Read: Trump kept book of Hitler speeches beside his bed, according to his ex-wife

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    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Darren Skelton
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:43 AM

    Coming soon – Aldi OS

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    Mute Alan Murphy
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    Feb 25th 2013, 7:13 PM

    Obviously to be followed the week after by the Lidl one

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    Mute MK
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:37 AM

    Would the windows os smartphones not be the third and Firefox the fourth?

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    Mute Bilbo Baggins
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    Feb 25th 2013, 11:58 AM

    They.have blackberry and now tizen to deal with too.

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    Mute LeeKelly
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    Feb 25th 2013, 12:46 PM

    LOL Microsoft mobile products. That’s a good one. Its already dead in the water along with Nokia who is flogging them. They’ve recently indicated they’re ready to make android phones in the near future and to prevent its total destruction and no amount of cash MS throws at then will make or worth their while.

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    Mute Eric Chubb
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    Feb 25th 2013, 10:09 AM

    I don’t see what niche Firefox OS is going to service. Their browser has been hemorrhaging users to Chrome for years, and iOS and Android are mature systems which are meeting most users needs. Another OS is just another headache for developers and users.

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    Mute stoner1916
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    Feb 25th 2013, 10:31 AM

    I have to agree with Eric here, i think they’ll struggle, android is already more or less free to use, Apple has it’s market. if these guys have a few good ideas they will just be copied by the others. Android became established because they were up against an established closed expensive opposition, they came in with the concept of being free, someone else now has to compete with two established companies the slick apple designs and the open free androids.
    What’s the Firefox edge?

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    Mute Dot Arse
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    Feb 25th 2013, 10:06 AM

    While OpenSource is great and all, the reality is constantly full of bugs – FireFox browser is one of the most resource heavy applications you can run

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    Mute Daniel Doran
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    Feb 25th 2013, 10:28 AM

    Agreed, the Android SDK feels like it’s being held together with duct tape.

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    Mute Barry O'Brien
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    Feb 25th 2013, 4:50 PM

    You’re talking crap. If open source is so buggy then linux wouldn’t be powering 70% or more of the worlds servers. I could go on and on with examples of the crap you are talking but I think my first point illustrates it nicely.

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    Mute Dot Arse
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:06 PM

    Conor, I was referring to FireFox and it’s browser with its countless bugs, not Linux which I am fully aware of

    http://m.threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/firefox-18-brings-21-updates-fixes-nearly-3000-bugs-010913

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    Mute David Kelly
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    Feb 25th 2013, 12:08 PM

    They’re really coming to the market *very* late. When you consider that even the mobile industry giant that is Nokia struggled (and ultimately failed) to get their next generation Maemo / Meego smartphone OS to market and even Windows Mobile 8 isn’t getting all that much traction so far, you’d have to wonder if there’s space for yet another mobile OS ?

    To me, it looks like Android is becoming to the mobile/tablet world what Windows is to the desktop world i.e. the de facto OS. It already has 68.4% of the global market!!

    Apple’s iOS is occupying a similar (but bigger) space to the Mac OS for laptops/desktops i.e. a very respectable market share of almost 20% of the global market, but a closed Apple-only hardware-software solution that occupies a chunk of the market at the high end. With that kind of chunk of the market, at the top end, and controlling the hardware, software and ecosystem (App Store). That still makes Apple an absolutely hugely profitable, runaway success.

    Blackberry’s rather niche and business-focused and fighting to stay relevant while Windows Mobile is still to prove itself as a main stream mobile OS. It may well do this year, but the jury’s still out.

    Personally, I just can’t see where Firefox’s Mobile OS would find a foothold in the market! It could be a great OS, but it would still have to sign up handset makers and create a massive ecosystem of developers to build apps before it would be even in the same league as Blackberry and Windows Mobile. Getting into the Google / Apple league would be a rather amazing feat if they ever achieved it!

    I don’t think it’s much of a challenge to Google or Apple to be perfectly honest.

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    Mute Jason Culligan
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    Feb 25th 2013, 2:04 PM

    There is always a market, especially in one as competitive as the mobile phone market. The problem is you need to offer something unique that sets your product apart. iOS has simplicity, Android has customisation and Blackberry’s OS is marketed as a business solution.

    Microsoft didn’t offer anything new to set it apart other than the name. What will this offer? If it does bring something new it will find traction but if it doesn’t it will be dead in the water.

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    Mute random
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:41 AM

    I guess you’re not anybody these days unless you have a mobile operating system.

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    Mute Conor Murphy
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    Feb 25th 2013, 10:08 AM

    Its not going to be here 2013. Thus is firmly a third world is for this year. Cheap and cheerful, wil probably be really successful at that

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    Mute Damien
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    Feb 25th 2013, 3:31 PM

    Android, iOS, Blackberry, Windows Mobile are the big 4.
    Now it seems everyone and their mother are making operating systems for phones: Firefox, Ubuntu, Samsung Tizen. Symbian and bada are still alive somewhere.

    More OS’ means more time developers take to make apps for each platform which in turn means slower updates, more bugs and less stable.

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    Mute random
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:51 AM

    Probably means the browser…

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    Mute random
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    Feb 25th 2013, 9:54 AM

    Uh, reply to Partysaurus this was.

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    Mute Henry Shields
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    Feb 25th 2013, 1:24 PM

    Mybe if they went with decent manufacturers they might have a chance but generally ZTE LG and Heuwei don’t make great handsets. This is talking from experience.

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