I have noticed a significant number of people here on HN and on reddit have learned programming and technical skills as children/adolescents and are brilliant at what they do, with great breadth and depth of knowledge studying at top notch universities and/or working at top tech firms and many running their own businesses too. This is true for other fields of study too like science, mathematics, economics and business where a lot of people either learn very quickly at young ages and on the other hand, there are many who start to learn very late and still become very proficient quite quickly.
I have also seen some people have remarkable people skills and business acumen, without having the familial background (which could explain their adeptness). You also have people working in FAANG and other such firms without a degree, while many others who also self learned or have a degree don't get a chance to work in such orgs.
What differentiates these people? Is it innate talent? Is it the ability to persevere and work hard? Is the ability to focus and work hard innate too?
