You slipped the blank slate fallacy here: the belief that people are born exactly equal, there is zero genetic component to IQ and programming capabilities, and all that is needed is "working hard" and "believing in yourself".
Nothing is incompatible with telling people to work as hard as possible and make the most of themselves and the idea that some people are more gifted than others.
"blank slate fallacy" ... Steven Pinker probably has to pay a marketing person a quarter every time someone says that. I should construct a straw man, position myself as a iconoclast against that straw man, and then rake in the TED/book deal $$$ instead of working hard like a chump.
This is far from universally accepted.