As with many of her fans, Taylor Swift and her discography has long been an important part of my personal story. She even became an unexpected source of inspiration during a moment of career transition.
I left my job as an aerospace engineer and human spaceflight designer at NASA to pursue an MBA at Harvard University, a shift that ultimately led to my current path as an economist and investor.
At Harvard, I started to think about Swift’s journey through a professional lens. I was driven by one key question: How do seemingly normal people do extraordinary things? How do they become these ultra-successful unicorns?
After reading an excellent book by legal scholar and documentarian Paul Davis, “Dedicated: The Case for Commitment in an Age of Infinite Browsing,” I began to recognize a number of characteristics that these highly successful people have in common.
There are seven traits in particular that Swift regularly demonstrates.
1. Imagination
We’re all born with imagination, but as we get older, we often put constraints between our minds and the creative stimuli in the world around us.
Not Swift. She turns small sparks such as a phrase, a feeling, an overheard line into entire worlds. A great way to do the same is by starting to take greater notice of the fragments that catch your eye. Ask yourself why, and then record them.
Swift understands that imagination begins not with invention, but with curiosity. She’s great at paying attention to the smallest, most resonant details and building universes from them.
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2. Synthesis
This is the ability to connect new and old ideas and thoughts through creativity. Creating synthesis requires bravery, because reimagining the world or doing things in ways that others haven’t is not easy.
Swift’s track record for synthesis speaks for itself. Her iconic song “Death by a Thousand Cuts” was actually inspired by the female protagonist’s relationship failure in the romantic comedy “Someone Great.”
But the most famous example of Swift’s skill for synthesis is “Love Story.” She reincarnated and reinterpreted the romantic Shakespearian tragedy of “Romeo and Juliet” into a story with a vibrant, happy ending.
3. Focus
Focus is about making your goal a part of your very being. Swift has not released a makeup line or a fashion brand. You don’t see her dabbling in things that aren’t important to her. Performing and songwriting have been her top priorities since she was teenager.
And she has been entirely focused on being the best at those things.
To sharpen your focus, ask yourself: Does this move me closer to my core goal, or is it just noise? Saying no to distractions isn’t a loss; it’s a way of assigning and protecting the energy needed to go deep where it matters most.
4. Doggedness
Doggedness is the ability to keep doing something or to keep fighting for it in the face of difficulty.
Think back to those moments on a stage when Swift was sick, exhausted, and heartbroken. The times during the Eras Tour when she was visibly crying during a song, when torrential rain made it look like she was swimming, and when she was performing the same set for the millionth time.
Yet she still acted as if it were the best, most monumental night of her life. Even if unicorns feel like they don’t have doggedness and passion all the time, they are usually pretty good at pretending they have it, until they can get it back again.
5. Passion
Passion is having continued enthusiasm, even when you’ve been doing something for a while or after it has lost its shine. Passion and doggedness often seem to overlap in that they both require endurance and resilience.
To reignite your own passion, reconnect with the “why” behind what you’re doing. Ask yourself what first drew you in, and find small ways to rediscover that joy, whether it’s through experimentation, reinvention, or persistence.
6. Reverence
This is the ability to be awed by and have deep respect for something.
It’s usually difficult to remain passionate, unless the object of your passion gives you a sense of internal happiness and wonder, a feeling that there is something bigger in the world than just you and whatever is right in front of you.
Reverence fuels your purpose, which then fuels your passion, and thus allows you to give your full dedication to something.
7. Commitment
The final trait is commitment, specifically in the context of forgoing all optionality in pursuit of this one thing over everything else. It is the commitment to recording music and touring, over going to university or any other career path for Swift.
Real commitment often requires sacrifice. Ask yourself: What am I willing to give up so this goal can live? When something is optional, it feels safe. But greatness is built by those who are willing to bet on the thing they love most.
This commitment is evident in Swift’s ability to, always and forever, put music first.
Sinéad O’Sullivan has an MBA from Harvard Business School, where she formerly served as the chief strategist of the HBS Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness. She has also worked at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management and was a professor at Illinois Institute of Technology’s Stuart School of Business. She is the author of “Good Ideas and Power Moves: Ten Lessons for Success from Taylor Swift.”
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