Majority always wins! Or does it not?

Reading time ~ 6 minutes

You must have read this catchy statement “To understand the importance of voting, just ask a candidate who’s lost an election by one vote”.

People instinctively know that Majority Always Wins. A politician knows this; and will go to any lengths to secure a majority. Terms such as ‘vote bank politics’ and ‘coalitions’ are not born just like that. And we see this pattern favouring a majority elsewhere as well.

• In a school, majority of students will decide the class Prefect.

• In employee or trade unions, it will be the majority that will decide who will be the union leader.

• Under the corporate laws, there are a whole bunch of rules to determine at what level of “majority” will a board resolution or a shareholder resolution be considered as approved. For example, for some resolutions a simple majority of more than 50% votes is considered fine. For others, like complex or important matters, a 2/3rd majority may be needed.  But it is always a majority!

• Even a majority in demographics will rule the decisions taken by business owners. Think about a first ever only ‘vegetarian’ offering by the big US Food Chain such as Pizza Hut, in the vegetarian majority Ahmedabad in Gujarat and you will know what I’m saying.

So, is being with the majority all the time always to your benefit? My answer: “It depends!” In certain situations, and when looked at from a different perspective, the entire equation simply flips around. Let me explain.

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When I was in my late teens and started pursuing my CA Course, our Professor, CA S.B. Zaware, used to always comment: “You must go from Majority to Minority”. He was obviously referring to the passing percentage of the students appearing for CA exams. Up until the 12^th Grade, majority of students appearing for an exam would pass. However, for the CA course, most students fail! That’s why Zaware Sir used to state – to crack the CA exam, you need to be in the minority!

As I got older, & gained more experience, I realized that being in a ‘minority’ could be a strong indicator of success. If you do not believe me, choose any field; and see who is in the minority. Those people will invariably be the most successful in that field:

• In a professionally managed organization with thousands of people, only a handful are the most successful, and they’d be sitting at the top, in a minority.

• In cricket, for a nation of a billion plus people, the ultra-successful are the squad in the Playing Eleven.

• Men’s tennis has been dominated just by three men (Federer, Nadal & Djokovic) for more than a decade.

• Similarly, very few people are content creators on the internet (Everyone else is just a consumer of such content). Even within the content creator space, there are a handful who are sitting right at the top. For example, from the hundreds of content creators on YouTube talking about stock markets, only a few are dominating the scene (e.g. My friend CA Rachana Ranade, who now boasts of a following of over 3 million people!)

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People say It is Lonely at the Top.

But when they say lonely, they are only referring to the quantitative aspect i.e. ‘Less in number’ or ‘minority’. If one were to look at the qualitative aspect, i.e. “The Feeling of Loneliness”, then I’m sure that such people are in the ‘majority’ on this planet.

Similarly, a majority of people are unhappy, stressed or simply going through the motions. Only a handful (or minority) of people can be regarded as being genuinely happy, or less stressed.

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This brings me to the key point of today’s story.  If you want to achieve any meaningful level of success in your field of choice, then you must be willing to get into a league of minority.

“Winners don’t do different things. They do things differently.”

Be willing to be different. Be willing to do what the majority is not doing. That may mean waking up early in the morning – when majority of the people are still asleep – to work on your mind, body and soul. And most importantly, you must immunize yourself from what the majority has to say about you or your work as you craft your path to success.  

The greatest inventions of mankind have come despite all the criticism around it. The inventors simply chose to ignore the naysayers (i.e. the majority).

Think about Wright Brothers and their invention of the airplane. At that time, majority of the people thought that the only thing that could fly was a bird. A newspaper editorial after hearing about the Wright Brothers’ first flight had declared: “The Wrights are either fliers or liars!”

On your way to success, don’t self-sabotage yourself by conforming to the views of the many. If you do that, there is a risk that you may never achieve your full potential.  There is an interesting aspect about the human psychology to conform to the majority view.

In an experiment conducted by the psychologist Solomon Asch back in the 1950s, it was proven that if a majority of people believe in something (which may be untrue), most people would tend to change their opinion just to “imitate the many”.

Asch and his team ran experiments with test subjects and other participants (who were all actors). Then all participants were given simple logic problems to solve. Initially, all the actors gave the correct answers which matched with the answers given by the test subjects. However, after some time, all the actors would agree on an incorrect answer, leaving the test subject alone with a different (read- correct!) answer. 

As James Clear writes about this research in his book, Atomic Habits:

“The subject, who was unaware of the ruse, would immediately become bewildered. Their eyes would open wide. They would laugh nervously to themselves. They would double-check the reactions of other participants. Their agitation would grow as one person after another delivered the same incorrect response. Soon, the subject began to doubt their own eyes. Eventually, they delivered the answer they knew in their heart to be incorrect.

Asch ran this experiment many times and in many different ways. What he discovered was that as the number of actors increased, so did the conformity of the subject. If it was just the subject and one actor, then there was no effect on the person’s choice. They just assumed they were in the room with a dummy. When two actors were in the room with the subject, there was still little impact. But as the number of people increased to three actors and four and all the way to eight, the subject became more likely to second-guess themselves. By the end of the experiment, nearly 75 percent of the subjects had agreed with the group answer even though it was obviously incorrect. Whenever we are unsure how to act, we look to the group to guide our behavior”.

Historically, humans have preferred to follow the tribe – to be with the many. In the past, this practice may have increased the probability of their survival. Think about the security provided in the safety of the village with other people, than being exposed to the dangers of the forest as an outcast.

However, the situation is now different, and confirming with the majority view may at times be a folly!

For instance, if most people believe that a company will do well, then its stock will go up (at least in the short term) leading to a bubble. That’s precisely why Warren Buffett says, “Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful.”  People are more likely to overpay for a stock when everyone else is also buying. On the contrary, when the market sentiment is bad, it may present a good value buying opportunity.

If your present circumstances are pulling you back from achieving success, maybe you need to reassess who you spend your time with.  Jim Rohn has famously said that, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”

Before I started taking care of my body (e.g. exercise & running) I was just like the majority of people. I had excess weight, was grumpy, stiff, and prone to illness.

However, as I changed, I went into a minority (of people who lead a healthy lifestyle). And in the process, I realized how little my knowledge was. I have a humorous example to share. During the Strength Training sessions at Pune Running, I got to know that there’s an exercise known as ‘Russian Twist’. Before that, the only thing Russian I knew was the ‘Vodka’!

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Concluding Thoughts

Mark Twain has famously said, “Whenever you find that you are on the side of the Majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).”

Ultimately, you need to keep in mind the following two aspects:

• To achieve a high degree of success in your chosen field, you must go from being in the ‘majority’ to being in the ‘minority’. And on your path, there will be a lot of people who would doubt you or ridicule you. In such instances, you need to have the courage to stick to your chosen path. Look at my example. For the past many years, I was just a reader (or a content consumer). Now, I’m trying to become a writer as well (i.e. content creator). My writing is still crappy and there is a lot to improve. But that is not stopping me from hitting the publish button. Over time, and with deliberate practice, I hope to improve, and get into the league of the minority!
• On your path to minority, there will be a lot of sacrifices that you’ll need to make. Be aware and mindful of what you are losing to get into that minority. As John Maxwell said “It is lonely at the Top. So you better know why you are there”. All the sacrifices made may be pointless, if you ultimately realize that you’ve climbed the wrong ladder. All the best.

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