Doesn’t Sean Combs like to pose? Look at him and Jay-Z again. Can anyone deny how the mogul’s persona flutters through the shutters? He marked his milestone 50th birthday this December. And it was a lavish party from the various accounts reported about the event: the list of guests, the ambience, the drinks and overall experience.

Quite naturally, I went in search of the small prints in the various accounts. I was looking for the pointers to his success, couched in the razzmatazz of the party. Sometimes, these pointers are disguised but like shadows, they are always nearby. Thankfully, I was rewarded in my search. I found the pointers to P-Diddy’s success were embedded in the ground rules for the party.

Below were the ground rules of the party:

Dance or don’t come

Black tie means black tie

Project ‘good vibrations.’

Rules are important to P-Diddy! Rules are a must for success. But rules themselves are not the main issue. Living by the rules; enforcing the rules is the real McCoy, like they say. Beneath all the razzmatazz is a strict adherence to rules.

Can you think of why those three rules were made, and what impact their strict observance made on the party, and by extension, what impact they have made on P-Diddy since he emerged on the hip-hop scene years ago.