Why Singaporeans must know when not to listen to Richard Branson

He came. He saw. He conquered.

Richard Branson was in Singapore recently and nearly everyone was hanging onto every word he uttered about how he takes on life with passion, and made money — tons of it — on the way.

Our respect and admiration undoubtedly goes to individuals who have braved the bad financial weather, embraced the emotional storms and sailed away from rough seas unscathed. Some live on to tell their amazing stories and we enviously wish inside to be as courageous and accomplished as them.

At the National Achiever's Congress 2013, Richard Branson was interviewed mostly about how he managed his difficult times and finally on what motivates him and how he handles his galactic ambitions. In awe, the common businessman jotted down possible recipes, likely formulaic steps and new things to try in his routine less flashy life so as to be and do like his billionaire hero.

Admittedly, it is recommended to learn from the mistakes of others simply because we will not live long enough to learn them all ourselves. Then again, when does the businessman turn away and say: "This is where the buck stops."; when does he stop running his business trying to force-fit others' methodologies into his model; and when does he simply stop listening to others for a moment.

This happens when he realises three things.

Firstly, contexts change.

Every situation has its unique combination of people, opportunities, emotions, luck and uncertainty. Dr. Marshall Goldsmith, pre-eminent executive coach, warns us that what got the businessman where he is will not get him where he wishes to be. In his drive to bring in more sales, to scale up his enterprise and to gain higher status, he keeps filling his to-do list with lessons from successful people. He may not realise that in a different landscape, what may work may be just to stop doing a few things or to drop some bad habits. Surprisingly, hardly any speaker talks about the credit he got from ceasing to do something badly. Think about it.

This continuous change of contexts contributes to success being a huge business vulnerability. Surprising, but true. The thirsty listener in the crowd eagerly drinks the best practices the speaker offers that worked in the latter's contexts. The listener implicitly assumes that these current practices have made the speaker a winner, bringing him to the top of his game. Unless questioned, he may not realise that instead of building on these best practices, he'd be merely trying to repeat old successes, not noticing that the world is rapidly and uncontrollably changing around him. Robert Herbold, an ex-Chief Operating Officer of Microsoft calls this the legacy thinking trap. The businessman is seduced by success.

Secondly, what motivates him is different to what motivates others.

This is a time when it makes sense for the businessman to listen to himself. In his reply to what motivates him, Richard Branson said that a good challenge would energise him and that the money comes afterwards. Others make money in a different sequence. It was clear that Richard Branson is motivated in his hundreds of ventures by what Daniel Pink, ranked in 2011 as one of the 50 most influential business thinkers in the world, would call autonomy (the desire to direct our own lives), mastery (the urge to get better and better at something that matters) and purpose (the yearning to do what we do in the service of something larger than ourselves).

Visionary cultural leader Sir Ken Robinson brings this idea further by asking whether one is living in his Element. The Element is where one's natural aptitudes meet one's personal passions. The Element is different for everyone. Copying that of others may be a mistake as being in his Element goes as deep as questioning why he is in his business in the first place — a question whose reply disillusions more than one.

For the businessmen at higher echelons, who have been there and done that, not only are motivations different to those at lower levels, but they also change with time. Steven Covey, International Entrepreneur of the Year recipient, puts it as reaching out for fulfillment, passionate execution and significant contribution. These businessmen become willing to tap into the higher reaches of human genius and motivation — what he could call voice — to acquire a new mindset, a new skill-set, a new tool-set, a new habit. Every voice is unique. Caught in the busy trap, one tends to forget this and fails to make one's voice heard, even to oneself.

Thirdly, he is more powerful than he thinks.

Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg puts it appropriately in her TEDWomen talk encouraging women to take on leadership positions: "...no one gets their promotion if they don't think they deserve their success, or if they don't even understand their success ... believe in yourself and negotiate for yourself. Own your own success..."

By negotiating for himself, he claims the power he has instead of relinquishing it to someone hierarchically higher by default, although power-distance is high in Singapore. Richard Branson will not be able to, neither should he give the standard operating procedure for handling mega challenges. The businessman would need to find and negotiate his own way out.

This realisation in itself would get him to gauge when to listen to the success of others and when to his own.