Oh Willy ...

According to Willy, in order to be successful you have to be “well liked”. The more liked you are in life the more opportunities and open doors will come from the people above you. To Willy, it’s more important to get ahead through people and to be popular than how hard you work or what you’re capable of doing. That is why he is so confused as to why Biff isn’t successful because he used to be well liked and as to why Charley is successful, since he isn’t well liked. Willy tries to figure this out throughout the play and has a hard time understanding that his philosophy does not always apply.