According to research conducted by University of California Santa Barbara economist Catherine Weinberger, the most successful business people excel in both cognitive ability and social skills, something that hasnt always been true. She crunched data linking adolescent skills in 1972 and 1992 with adult outcomes, and found that in 1980, having both skills didnt correlate with better success, whereas today the combination does. The people who are both smart and socially adept earn more in todays work force than similarly endowed workers in 1980, she says.