Book SummaryThe Third Door, by Alex Banayan

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of The Third Door

Alex Banayan writes that success is like a nightclub with three doors: The first is the main entrance, through which you enter by working hard and playing by the rules. The line to this door is crowded and moves slowly. The second door is reserved for billionaires and celebrities and is off-limits to the ordinary person. In The Third Door, he focuses on the last option—the door that allows regular folk to achieve extraordinary things by skipping the line, finding hidden opportunities, and thinking outside the box. He argues it’s the best—and really, only—route to getting ahead of the crowd.

In the middle of his studies as a pre-med student, Banayan discovered he no longer had a passion for his chosen track of becoming a doctor. He began wondering what...

The Third Door Summary Get Help From Others

Throughout the book, Banayan discovers repeatedly that to become successful, you need to reach out to others for help. He first learned the value of asking for help when he sought funding for his book by competing on The Price Is Right, a US television show in which contestants guess the prices of various items. He wasn’t very familiar with the show, and so didn’t know what prices to guess. However, he asked the audience for their opinions and by doing so, came up with the winning answer. The experience taught him that people are generally happy to help you if you only ask.

Another way people are happy to help, Banayan discovered repeatedly, is by providing a personal, inside connection to an industry. He finds that having an inside connection is one of the most effective ways you can further your career because such a person allows you access to opportunities you otherwise wouldn’t have. Entrepreneur Elliott Bisnow and filmmaker Steven Spielberg both had insights on the importance of finding an inside connection.

(Shortform note: Banayan isn’t the first to notice that humans like to help each other. In Behave, Robert...

The Third Door Summary Be Persistent

To write his book, Banayan had to be persistent in tracking down famous people over several years. One lesson he learned from this process was that although business books tout endless, relentless persistence, it’s possible to take persistence too far—in several cases, the people he pursued blacklisted him, or nearly did, because his persistence crept over the line into harassment. He learned that it’s important to know when to pull back and that you should remain professional and recognize when you’re going too far.

(Shortform note: Banayan’s caution about not crossing from persistence to harassment applies not only to business situations but also to personal relationships. In either case, people who refuse to take “no” for an answer are often hoping to change the other person’s mind, and they don’t recognize—or refuse to recognize—when negotiation has turned into manipulation. Experts advise that to avoid crossing that line, you learn to see “no” as [an opportunity to...

The Third Door Summary Establish Your Credibility

Banayan purposefully chose interviewees who had, like him, started their careers as unknowns, and therefore faced a lack of credibility as they tried to get established. Several of the people he spoke with had advice on how to convince others to invest in you before you have a proven track record.

(Shortform note: Credibility is defined as trustworthiness or the ability to inspire belief. In the business world, credibility is an essential part of establishing your company or career—without it, you’ll struggle to attract customers, employees, investors, and partners, or to get favorable terms for loans or contracts.)

Tim Ferriss: Borrow Credibility

Tim Ferriss, entrepreneur, life coach, and author of The 4-Hour Workweek, a best-selling book about how to...

The Third Door Summary Follow Your Own Path

One lesson that Banayan repeatedly came across was that even if you copy everything someone else has done, you can’t expect to replicate their success. This is because what works for one person won’t work in the same way for another person—there will be different factors and details that make it impossible to fully follow someone else’s path. Instead, you have to figure out what path will lead you to your own, unique success. What can you do that will leverage your particular strengths, skills, and circumstances?

(Shortform note: Many career advisers recommend finding your own unique path in life, but in The Defining Decade, Meg Jay cautions against taking that advice too far. She writes that young adults often get caught up in the idea that their life should be as unique and original as possible, which ironically, can set you up for failure: If you’re caught up trying to do something no one else has done, you might miss out on mastering basic skills and getting fundamental experiences that can actually launch you to...

The Third Door Summary Let Your Values Guide You

Banayan heard from several of his interviewees how important it was to know your values and to design your life’s choices around them.

Steve Wozniak: Follow Your Own Values

When Banayan met with Steve Wozniak, the co-founder, along with Steve Jobs, of Apple, he found someone who didn’t fit the mold of an extremely successful businessperson: Wozniak defined success not by typical hallmarks like power, fame, or wealth, but by how his actions aligned with his values and how that led to personal happiness.

Wozniak said that society expects people to pursue power and money, but he decided early in his career that those goals wouldn't make him happy. Instead, he had two goals: to create something—through engineering—that would benefit the world, and to live his life “on his own terms”: In other words, to do things he wanted to do rather than what society expected him to do.

To accomplish those goals, he lived according to his personal values. As such, he turned down executive positions at Apple, choosing instead to remain an engineer—a role that made him happier.

It also meant being honest and treating people well. One incident that showed this in action was when he...

The Third Door Summary Work Hard Today for Payoff Tomorrow

Several of Banayan’s interviewees emphasized the importance of working extra hard early in your career, arguing that the long-term gains you’ll earn are worth the effort and the sacrifice of short-term comfort. Two interviewees in particular who made that attitude a cornerstone of their careers were Grammy Award-winning rapper Pitbull and Microsoft executive Qi Lu.

Pitbull: Always Be Learning

Armando Perez, better known as Pitbull, who has produced award-winning music in multiple genres and started his own charter school, told Banayan that his secret to success is his willingness to approach any new venture with the mindset of an intern: be willing to work a low-wage, low-level job to learn about an industry from the bottom up.

Pitbull argues that when you do menial tasks and function as an assistant to others, you can get a foot in the door and gain access to insights and wisdom from experienced people. Even if you’re already successful in a different field, you should be ready to start at the bottom in any new field you approach. By constantly learning in this way, you’ll ultimately be a better executive because you’ve learned how the business works at every...

The Third Door Summary Don’t Let Setbacks Derail You

Many of the people Banayan interviewed overcame difficult challenges in their lives and their careers. Lady Gaga and Quincy Jones both gave him insights on how to bounce back from setbacks so that you don’t derail your progress.

Lady Gaga: See Your Mistakes as Strengths

Banayan wasn’t able to sit down with Lady Gaga for an official interview, but he did meet her briefly and, through a mutual acquaintance, became involved in planning her media response to the criticism of her recently released album. The lesson he learned from how she handled that criticism was that if you have a strong sense of your values, you can spin your failures as successes as long as they align with those values.

The phenomenal success of her first two albums made Gaga a worldwide star, but critics panned her third album, ARTPOP, and sales were low. For several months after the album’s release, Gaga struggled to respond to this criticism, and the negative reviews were hard on her. However, she ultimately realized that the unusual character of her album—which is what prompted the negative reviews—was consistent with her brand of always defying expectations. Since her previous albums had been...

Shortform Exercise: Establish Your Credibility

When starting out, one of the hardest challenges you may face is convincing a skeptical client or business partner that you can deliver what you promise. Consider some of the tips from Tim Ferriss, Bill Gates, and Maya Angelou to plan how you might improve your credibility.

Is there an organization you can associate yourself with that you can borrow credibility from? Is there somewhere you can volunteer or offer your services to meet some need of theirs?