Criteria for Success

The criteria for academic success at Oxford and Cambridge match those determining career success.
Formulating success requires:

• Perspective – you need to realise what you are up against, how you need to carefully structure your time, how hard you need to work, how disciplined you need to be, how formidable your competition will be.
• Astute strategic planning – you need to review in detail the structure of your degree, identify the optimal means of navigating the requirements of your degree, appropriate choice of required supplementary courses, recognize your strengths and mitigate your weaknesses.
• Astute tactical planning – you need to ensure all your work is focused towards endgame success, tailor work towards examination success, minimize redundant work, never write verbose essays when focused exam preparation notes will prove more helpful.
• Risk management – you need to realise effective time management is crucial, your workload will overwhelm you if you do not allocate your time appropriately, never invest too much time on work that does not contribute to endgame success.
• Commitment, Stamina, Motivation – you need to work harder than everybody else, an insatiable desire to succeed, an unrelenting competitive spirit.
• Self-Discipline, Mental Strength – you need to understand and control your mind, your ability to leverage the power of your subconscious mind, your ability to maintain positive momentum, your ability to focus when under extreme stress, your ability to adopt a streetfighter mentality in adversity.
• Autodidactic Capability – you need to learn how to teach yourself complex concepts from recommended reading material, identify core (rather than superfluous) reading material, identify core concepts, break down complex concepts into fundamental principles from which other concepts may also be derived.