“You have been looking for the perfect Pepsi. You’re wrong. You should have been looking for the perfect Pepsis.”

– Howard Moskowitz

In his Ted Talk ‘Choice, happiness and spaghetti sauce‘, Malcolm Gladwell exalts Howard Moskowitz for changing how the food industry thought about food. Moskowitz, a market researcher and pyschophysicist, was hired by PepsiCo to find the perfect diet Pepsi. When charting all the preferences of consumer tastes according to the artificial sweetness of the cola, he was confused as to why there was no one preferred level of sweetness. The chart was an uncorrelated mass of results.

Later on, through his breakthrough with spaghetti sauces, Howard Moskowitz democratised the food industry. Like with diet Pepsi, he realised that there was not a perfect spaghetti sauce, but rather there were perfect spaghetti sauces. He believed that neither variation of spaghetti sauce was more superior to the other; and that there was no universal notion of how a spaghetti sauce should be. Howard Moskowitz taught us that since we have different preferences, to apply universal principles to food would most likely bring our total happiness down.

Watching this Ted Talk got me thinking about role models (bear with me). There has always been a sense that we should follow “one” role model to lead our lives. When faced with dilemmas or decisions, one of the most common questions people ask themselves is: “What would (insert most inspiring, outstanding or upright member of society here – e.g. Jesus, Martin Luther King, Eleanor Roosevelt, Immanuel Kant) do?” When we were children, we were asked which famous person do we want to be like when we grow up. In our careers, we are often advised to seek out a leader in our field to aspire to.

As commendable as these approaches are, I don’t agree that they are entirely realistic or at times helpful. These outstanding members of society are, well, outstanding and unfortunately, not all of us are blessed with such ‘outstandingness’. Secondly, can we really look to that one role model to guide us through the multi-faceted aspects of life? And to top it off, we are not them (the role models), but us (me and you) – and because of this, we need different people to help us with the different parts of our lives.

It is widely reported that there are not enough female role models and that such role models can have a positive impact on women’s performance. I whole heartedly agree. But I would like to share the view that role models closer to home – in their many, and either female or male – have just as much of an impact.

I have certainly benefited from having role models who correspond to the many roles in my life: be they the unattainable ones or those that live next door. What I have found however, is that the latter have had a much greater impact on me: I follow a female colleague’s example of effectively managing expectations and setting boundaries at work; I look to the erudite and laid-back manner of an old professor when figuring out the ways of the world; I look at my best friend’s loving partnership when trying to set the standards of my own; I am spurred on by my mother’s relentlessness to always see things through, even when the going gets tough.

By testing different types of spaghetti sauce, Howard Moskowitz taught us about happiness. “That is the final and most beautiful lesson of Howard Moskowitz,” says Gladwell, “that in embracing diversity in human beings, we will find a surer way to true happiness.” Following the spaghetti rationale, we ought to embrace the wisdom of the many perfect role models in our lives. That, I believe, is a sure way to true happiness.