Sept. 23, 2025

Success Is a Numbers Game: Change the Odds, Hit Bigger Goals

In this high-impact episode of Beyond Confidence, host Divya Parekh is joined by award-winning strategy consultant and HBR contributor Kyle Austin Young to break down a bold truth: success isn’t just about willpower—it’s about odds.

Beyond Confidence is broadcast live Tuesdays at 10AM ET on W4WN Radio - Women 4 Women Network (www.w4wn.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com). Beyond Confidence TV Show is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).

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The topics and opinions expressed on the following show are

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This is Beyond Confidence with your host dvpark. Do you

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want to live a more fulfilling life? Do you want

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to live your legacy and achieve your personal, professional, and

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financial goals? Well? Coming up on ZVO Parks Beyond Confidence,

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you will hear real stories of leaders, entrepreneurs, and achievers

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who have steps into discomfort, shattered their status quo, and

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are living the life they want. You will learn how

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relationships are the key to achieving your aspirations and financial goals.

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Moving your career business forward does not have to happen

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at the expense of your personal or family life or

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vice versa. Learn more at www dot divpork dot com

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and you can connect with tv ants contact dants dvpark

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dot com. This is beyond confidence and now here's your

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host TV Park.

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Good morning listeners. So great to be here with y'all.

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And I just want to share today. Sometimes it's important

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to extend kindness to yourself as well. So and when

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I talk about kindness is sometimes it's also the kindness

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comes as a gentle nudge, and I want to share.

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As it was, it was hard for me to wake

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up in the morning, and I gave myself a gentle nudge,

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got out of the bed, and this was not in

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the mood. And then all of a sudden I came

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upon this tiny little sprinkler and a ray of sunshine

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falling on it that inspired me to write the poem.

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So at my core of my heart, I am a writer.

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I just want to share that little poem before it

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gets started today. So this morning I nearly surrendered to

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the warmth of the bed, to the whisper that said stay.

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I rose, unwilling, steps heavy, the world dull and gray.

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Then a sprinkler scattering diamonds in the sun, ordinary turned luminous, resistance,

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turn and wonder, and I knew if I had not moved,

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I would have missed this miracle. So I want to

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invite your shelf to be kind to your shelf by

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even nudging, because sometimes we will give into our zone

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of comfort. So that's my little share for the day,

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and let's bring on our guest.

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I'm sorry, I didn't mean interrupt you.

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Oh no, you're fine. Welcome.

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Thank you for having me. What a beautiful poem. How

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am I going to follow that?

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Oh, it's it's just it was in the moment, nothing there,

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And I thought that it was very becoming. Since you

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talk about success, you talk about achieving those bigger goals

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by changing the odds.

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And.

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This experience was just very befitting. So let me ask

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you usually start out from your childhood, youth, or anyone

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in your life who left to positive mark on you.

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I appreciate that. Yeah, I'm going to tell a story

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from my early twenties. When I graduated college, I was

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very motivated to try to skip as many rungs as

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I could on the corporate ladder. I wasn't really inspired

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by the entry level positions that I was seeing, so

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I wanted to try to pursue something that had the

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opportunity to grow as a leader and to try to

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make a real impact in an organization. So I worked

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very hard and did some very creative things. I talk

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about those in the book when I talk about how

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to improve your odds of getting a promotion or a

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job that might feel out of reach. And I ultimately

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became the product development director at a growing health organization.

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And at that time, this was almost fifteen years ago,

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I was managing people who were twice my age, had

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more credentials, more experience, more education than I did. And

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it was great to get the job, but there was

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a lot of pressure and there were a lot of

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people who were really questioning whether or not I could

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do this well. And I knew that if I made

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a big mistake, there was going to be a risk

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that I wasn't going to be able to hang onto

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this job for very long. And I did make a

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big mistake. I made a mistake pretty quickly. Actually, I

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misunderstood a relationship that we had with a contractor, a

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graphic designer. I thought this person was being paid by

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the project, and turned out there being paid by the hour.

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I had either been told incorrect information, or I'd misunderstood

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or misremembered it, and so we had made some decisions

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in the work that we gave this person that had

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an enormous impact on our bill, things that we could

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have done internally. We sent off thinking that it was

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all paid for and it wasn't. And so again, this

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is about fifteen years ago, and one day I came

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to work, opened my inbox and I found an expected

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invoice for six thousand dollars that was not in the budget.

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And it was the result of this misunderstanding and the

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relationship we had with this contractor. And at first I

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thought he's mistaken, that that's not our agreement. Then finally

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I was able to find the original agreement from my predecessor,

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and I saw that the contractor was correct. He had

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built us appropriately and we really did owe him six

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thousand dollars. And this was that big mistake that I'd

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been dreading making that I thought I had the potential

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to derail this exciting position before it really even got going.

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And so I had to face the music and I walked,

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you know, walked through the halls to the cfo's office.

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I reported directly to the CFO and I knocked on

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the door. He was sitting there on the computer. He

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turned around. He said, what's going on? And I said,

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I need to tell you the truth. We have this

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contractor and I've misunderstood our relationship with him, and as

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a result, I've spent six thousand dollars that was not

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in the budget. And I take that really seriously. I

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feel terrible about this. It's not going to happen again,

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but I wanted to tell you directly and let you

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know that this happened. And I still remember the CFO

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again fifteen years ago. He leans back, he closes his eyes,

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he takes a deep breath, and I thought, I'm about

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to get fired. And then finally he leans forward and

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he said, you know, Kyle, when we learn something, there's

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usually a cost, and in some context we call that

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cost tuition. And in the context of you know, school,

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we're very very comfortable with the idea that learning comes

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at a cost. We're very comfortable with the idea that

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we pay tuition for the insights that we gained in

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this life. And he said, I think a lot of

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us forget that when we move into our professional lives,

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and you've recently made that transition from school into your

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professional life. And he said, we're going to call this

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six thousand dollars bill tuition, and the tuition is go

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find all the agreements that your predecessor entered into, read them,

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and do your best to abide by those terms. And

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then he just turned back around and went back to work, okay,

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And so I went back and I did exactly that,

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And it was a helpful lesson for me, both in

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the context of doing some homework to not make any

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assumptions about the terms of these different agreements that we had,

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but also this idea that learning comes at a cost,

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that we can call that tuition, and that when we

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are comfortable with the idea that we're typically going to

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pay some form of tuition or other in order to

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learn the things that we need to succeed in life,

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it can help us, you know, have the confidence to

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take risks and to experiment and to do the things

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that will ultimately make us better tomorrow.

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Yes, that's a beautiful story, and it's such a fine,

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such a fine example of leadership. Rather than penalizing you,

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he helped you see just a different side and a

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different angle from looking at the situation from a different

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lens and saying that listen, I'm here to support you.

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Just don't make it again. And he also gave you

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the path to that. I love that story. Thank you

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for sharing it. So share with us. You know some

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of the things you mentioned that you did not want

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to climb many wrongs while you reached to the top

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of the letter. So any of their stories, like you know,

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where did your life Johnny take you after that? And

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any nuggets as you grew in your career.

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Sure in the context of that organization, I ultimately did

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very well for several years and was able to have

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a great impact and got excellent reviews. I ended up

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being a part of a layoff, and so that derailed

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my life a little bit. I accepted another leadership position.

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I was laid off again. That derailed my life a

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little bit. And at that point I was tired of

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telling my wife that I'd lost my income so unexpectedly,

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so I decided to start consulting. I wanted a more

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diversified income. I wanted to have several clients so that

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I could never be in that position again. So I

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used the skills that I got from those two leadership positions.

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I started consulting and I was working with a long

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list of clients. These were all people who had big goals,

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and since I was just starting out at that time

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many years ago, a lot of them were people who

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other consultants had passed on. These weren't necessarily the people

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who were the most likely to succeed. I knew that

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my job, if I was going to find success in

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this field of consulting, was I was going to have

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to ultimately do everything in my power to optimize these

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people's odds of success, to do whatever I could to

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help them achieve the things that they wanted to achieve.

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Some people kind of base their careers around the idea of, well,

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I did what I was hired to do, you know,

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I did what I was paid for. I did my part.

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And I always recognized that if my clients weren't successful,

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even though they might have positive feelings toward me, if

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the projects failed, they weren't going to be able to

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pay me, they weren't going to be able to continue

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hiring me. That these people and their organizations had to

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be successful for me to be employed long term as

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a contractor with these different companies. So a lot of

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times I went well outside the scope of my job

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and trying to understand what would it really take for

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these people to find success, And through that I developed

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a tool which is the foundation of my new book.

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It's called a success diagram, and a success diagram is

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where you map out everything that has to go right

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for you or for your client to get the outcome

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that they want. Everything that has to go right. You

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brainstorm the potential bad outcomes, what are the things that

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could happen instead of what we need to happen, And

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you have an opportunity if you want to, to layer

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some very simple math on top of that that you

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can do on your cell phone calculator and get a

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real sense of your odds of success currently. And then

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in the book, I take people through a five step

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framework for improving their odds and when they're done, they

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can do the math again, see how it's improved, and

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make more informed decisions about what goals to pursue and

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make smarter decisions in the context of those individual goals.

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Yeah. No, absolutely, so it sounds like definitely creating that

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certainty in the uncertainty of situation and things. So if

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our listeners are like, you know, like you know, as

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they're listening to our conversation. I'm definitely sure they're curious, like,

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what are those five steps?

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Sure? Well, when I teach people, some of those steps

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are contextualized in the book, but the general principles First,

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you need to create a success diagram, and a success

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diagram the building blocks of that are what I call

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critical points. Critical points are everything that has to go

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right in order for you to get what you want. So,

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if you're comfortable with it, can I share an analogy

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of that?

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Oh? Please, definitely, And also kind of I'm sure, like

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you know, the next question is going to be that

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how do we know, like you know, which other right

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things or which other things that have to go right.

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Sure, I'm going to put that one on hold just

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really quickly while I explain the framework a little bit,

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and then I'll try to speak to how we identify

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the things that need to happen in order for us

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to accomplish our goal. So I'm going to use the

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analogy of maybe you are thinking about running a marathon,

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and you don't have a lot of time to prepare,

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but that's a goal a lot of people have, a

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lot of people are interested in running a marathon, and

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while a lot of organizational goals are very context specific.

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This is something I think we can all kind of

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wrap our heads around. So let's say you're preparing for

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a marathon on short notice. You have ninety days to

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get ready, and you know that's not a lot of time.

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So you hire a running coach, and your running coach

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tells you, we're short on time. But this is doable

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if you can do three things. She says, I have

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a plan that has three different steps. The first thing

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is you're going to have to stick to my fitness

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plan for ninety days. You're going to run, you're going

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to train, You're going to get ready physically.

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She says.

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The second thing you're going to have to do is

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you're going to stick to my nutrition plan. If you

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aren't eating the way that I need you to eat,

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you aren't going to be able to recover, you aren't

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going to be able to train. It's not going to work.

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And then she says, the third thing you have to

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do is I have a sleep schedule, and you have

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to sleep according to the sleep schedule so that you're

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going to be ready. And if you do all three

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of these things, I can get you to the point

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where you're going to be able to run that marathon

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in ninety days. All of my clients who actually stick

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with this plan are able to make it. But if

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you cheat on any of these things, if you only

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do one of them, or you only do two of them,

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or you only do them half the time, you're not

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going to be ready. You're not going to be able

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to finish that race in just three months. So let's

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take this idea. We're making this up, but this is

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a situation where we have three things that need to

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go right for us to accomplish our goal. We need

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to stick with a fitness plan, a nutrition plan, and

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a sleep schedule. Okay, so we have an opportunity to

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ask ourselves how likely do we think we are to

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accomplish each of those three steps? And I want to

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keep this really simple, but I am going to put

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some numbers to it. Let's say that I think if

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there's a seventy percent chance I'll stick with the fitness plan,

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a seventy percent chance I'll stick with a nutrition plan,

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and a seventy percent chance I'll stick with the sleep schedule.

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I'm keeping this very simple. There's three things that need

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to go right. We think there's a seventy percent chance

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that will do each of those things well. What most

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humans do in this situation is something called averaging. We

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look at a goal we consider, to some extent in

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our own minds, the things that need to go right,

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and if we feel good about each of them individually,

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then we will feel good about the goal as a whole.

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But that's actually not realistic. If these are true prerequisites

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to success, where every single one of them has to

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go right in order for us to accomplish what we

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intend to accomplish, then we can't average. What we actually

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have to do from a mathematical standpoint is we have

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to multiply. In this case, that's point seven times point

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seven times point seven. That's very easy. I've picked up

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my cell phone, I've typed that in and what I

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find is I have a thirty four percent chance of

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accomplishing this goal. If it's true that I have to

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stick with this fitness plan, this nutrition plan, and this

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sleep schedule in order to be ready to run this

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marriag on, I only have a thirty four percent chance

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of doing all three of those things, even though individually

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they look good. The odds that I'm going to slip

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up on at least one of them are pretty high,

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and the odds that I'm ultimately going to successfully run

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twenty six miles are very low. So what the book

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teaches you how to do is after you've created a

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success diagram, after you've gotten a sense of how likely

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you are to accomplish a goal, we then start brainstorming

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what are the potential bad outcomes that could keep you

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from accomplishing each of these individual steps. So let's take

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the idea of the fitness plan. What are some things

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that might keep me from following through and actually accomplishing

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what I'm needing to do in order to prepare physically well.

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It's possible that on a day when I have to run,

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it might be raining outside and I wouldn't be able

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to go for a run. What can I do in

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response to that, Well, it might be smart to have

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a gym membership. It might be smart to have a

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treadmill in my house. It might be smart to buy

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an extra set of running shoes and keep them in

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the car so that there's a break in the weather,

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I can make the most of it whenever and wherever

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I am. So those are some responses we could have

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to what if I'm concerned that I'm going to deal

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with the lack of motivation. You wrote a beautiful poem

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that started with you feeling like you didn't want to

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leave the warmth of bed, Right, Well, if I don't

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want to leave the warmth of bed on a day

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when I need to run, what can I do to

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help with that? Well, one thing that might help is

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maybe I need a running partner. Maybe I need someone

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who can bring some accountability and who can help me

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stay motivated to actually get up and follow through on

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these intentions. What's the third thing that could derail me?

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You know, it's possible that I could be derailed, and

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again I'm making these up as we go, but maybe

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by some kind of injury. So a good stretching routine,

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something that could prevent things like shin splints might be

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really smart. So what we're doing is we're trying to

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identify what are the bad outcomes that could keep us

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from doing this. And what most humans do in this

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situation is, rather than thinking about what could go wrong,

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we try to double down on this desire to succeed.

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We try to use desire as this antidote to uncertainty.

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If somebody said, you know, why are you so confident

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that you're going to be able to run this marathon?

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They might say, well, I just really want it, I'm

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really committed to this, I'm really focused. But at the

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end of the day, none of those things measurably improve

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your odds of success. Being really confident or being really

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focused isn't going to prevent the rain from coming tomorrow.

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Being really committed to running a marathon isn't going to

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prevent a shin splint. The things that could actually prevent

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that are what I call these hacks, these ways to

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try to take the risk out of a potential bad outcome.

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At a friend who read the book recently, he said,

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you've created a plan for systematically de risking your goals,

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and I think that there's a lot of truth in that.

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So what I teach people how to do is after

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they've identified their critical points, after they've layered some math

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on it potentially, and after they have identified the bad

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outcomes that could get in their way, we look at

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ways to make those less likely. And so I just

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want to demonstrate the impact of that. I talked about

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how in the previous example, we had about a thirty

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four percent chance of successfully being ready on race day

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based on what this running coach has told us. So

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let's change the numbers. Let's say that after creating all

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these contingency plans, after buying the extra set of running shoes,

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after getting the gym membership, after finding a running harder,

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after initiating the stretching routine, and being similarly intentional with

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the idea of a nutrition plan, with the idea of

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a sleep schedule. Let's say that after that we are

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convinced that there's a ninety percent chance will follow through

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from a fitness point of view, and a ninety percent

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chance will follow through from a nutrition point of view,

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a ninety percent chance will follow through from a sleep

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point of view. If we multiply that out, we find

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that we now have a seventy three percent chance ultimately

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being ready on race day. So we went from a

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thirty four percent chance of success to a seventy three

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percent chance of success. And we did that by diagramming

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what had to go right, being honest with ourselves about

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what could potentially go wrong, and using our creativity too,

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as my friend says, systematically de risk this goal, and

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in doing so, we took something that was a predicted

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failure and we turned it into a predicted success. There's

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a seventy three percent chance guarantee that you're going to

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follow through on all of these things. It doesn't guarantee it,

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but we've dramatically changed our odds over the course of

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a single goal that can change your outcome, over the

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course of many goals that can change your career, and

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over the course of a whole lifetime of goals that

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can change your legacy.

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Oh that was beautiful because what I'm hearing, Kyle is that, Okay,

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here's what you want, here's the outcomes, like you know

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