Key Ingredients for Success

I gave this keynote speech to a roomful of women chemists at a Chemistry symposium at the St. Anne's Womens College last weekend.

"We are in this room to celebrate 100 years since the award of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Marie Curie. To the world, Madame Curie represents a woman successful in her chosen field. All around us, specially in Hyderabad where we live, we see posters and billboards of successful women, sportswomen Sania Mirza and Saina Nehwal; the current Miss India from Andhra Pradesh, Kiran Majumdar-Shaw, successful in the Indian biotechnology industry. All of us want to be successful but what does success mean to you? Money? Fame? Admiration of peers? Winning competitions? Do you want to be successful? What is your definition of success? Each one of us has a specific and highly personal definition of success at any given time in our life. More importantly, the definition of success is also highly dynamic. If you think your luck or fate or destiny determines your ability to succeed, think again.
No matter what your definition is, there are some ingredients that are necessary for success.

I have picked 7 ingredients that I feel are key to success:
1. Dreams - Dreaming is essential. But write down your dream so it becomes a goal.
2. Hard work - "The only place success appears before hard work is in the dictionary"
3. Opportunity - Stay tuned for opportunities that knock on your door. Someone once told me, luck is opportunity meeting preparation. So when you work hard and prepare, you will be able to see the opportunity. Others will think you are lucky but you know what really happened.
4. Failures - Paradoxically, failures are essential for success. The most interesting stories of successful people are full of challenges, troubles and obstacles. So don't be sidetracked by failures.
5.Self-belief - If you don't believe in yourself, how will others? More of my confidence comes from my failures and challenges that from my success.
6. Constant learning - Learning does not stop when you leave college but learn something everyday, from everyone. This is another way to boost your self-belief.
7. Positive thinking - When others ingredients don't seem to be doing much, this last and final ingredient will help you stay the course.

The one enemy of success is "fear". Fear is not just about failure, sometimes we are afraid of success, actually we are just afraid of change. Gautam Buddha said "To see what few have seen, you must go where few have gone before." So we must first overcome fear of change. Since change is the only constant in life, we need to persevere as we come across challenges. Life, after all, is a marathon, not a sprint.

As was mentioned earlier, although 40% of students in a college classroom full of students pursuing higher education in a scientific field are women, the number decreases to 1% as we survey those who pursue science careers. It has been shown that men are 3 times more likely than women to occupy positions of power and prestige in these fields. Why do we see such a gross disparity? When it comes to innate intelligence and ability, women are as capable as men but the reality of the obstacles in life push women towards dropping out. Reasons for dropping out of a Ph.D. program may include family demands, conflicts with academic guides, research projects difficulties, funding problems etc. Dropping out of work may involve non-cooperation from family, unfair bosses, unreasonable demands of work, disparity in pay and promotion, work practices that do not help work-life balance. Each difficulty seems insurmountable and a good enough reason to drop out. Does the choice to leave the work force affect just the individual woman?

No. When a woman leaves the workforce, she impacts her future as well as that of the others who follow her. We have very few women in decision-making positions because of the lack of constancy and the commitment to stay the course. There is a solution to each problem that you face in the workplace, sometime it is as simple as asking someone who has tackled the same problem. My advice to all of you is to continue working, continue moving ahead.

I would like to share some of my favorite "How to's?" These have been collected by years of reading wonderful writers and inspiring people.

How to become successful?
As Indira Gandhi said, she was told that "there are two kinds of people in this world - those who do all the work and those who take the credit. Try to stay in the first group since there is less competition there." No substitute for hard work.

How to make your dreams come true?
Write them down, make them your goals.

How to predict your future?
Create it.

How to change your fate?
Change your attitude.

Walt Disney talked about 4 Cs for success
- Curiosity
- Confidence
- Courage
- Constancy

I leave you with one last thought, a sure remedy for days when none of the above advice seems to work. LAUGHTER. Having a sense of humor about your life puts you back on the positive thinking track.