Managing Success

 

What is Success?

Many people define success differently. It could be as simple as the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.

Good old Wikipedia defines success as the state or condition of meeting a defined range of expectations. It may be viewed as the opposite of failure. Different people measure success differently.

A good question would be what is success to you? I would very much want to read your responses in the comments.

More important however is how do we go about the process of managing success. For many people it is a difficult task to get to the top (whatever the top is in their context) but it is actually much more difficult to stay at the top.

You can’t start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading the last one-anonymous.

There are many forces and factors that stand in the way of that person who has risen to the top all trying as though by default to bring the person down. Maintaining and growing on your success is one of our greatest challenges. When it is not pride assaulting you, you could find yourself struggling with impostor syndrome. For some people what their success affords them is the very thing that brings them down. It is said your true character is revealed when you have the means to do it without having to care what anyone else thinks. Money they say doesn’t change people, it merely unmasks them. Apart from this very obvious challenges to the maintenance of our success, what other forces are at work in trying to bring us down.

Carey Nieuwhof says the greatest enemy of your future success is your current success

Threats to the maintenance of your success

1)      Comfort with the Status quo. When you get to a point where you think you have arrived, then you are in danger of losing it all. There is a big difference between contentment and being comfortable with the status quo. The former teaches you to be grateful for the far you have come while leaving the door open for greater advancement while the latter tells you that there is no reason to go further. It is possible to mistakenly believe that there is no higher height than what you have achieved until someone else comes and surpasses your record. Records exist to be broken and therefore if you choose not to break your own, remember someone else will come along and do it. You need to remain hungry if your success is going to be sustainable. Complacency is the fastest killer of success. We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things because we are curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths-Walt Disney. 

2)      Arrogance. The other danger you are likely to fall into is that of a know it all. Arrogance keeps you from learning from others because you mistakenly think you are the smartest bloke in the room. When this happens, people start avoiding you and cannot offer you any advice. When you get to a point where you are surrounded by Yes-men who do not question anything you are doing, then you are on your way down.  While you don’t have to do everything people suggest, you must never reach that point where you don’t listen to anyone for that matter. Jim Collins says in how the Mighty fall that leaders who broker success over a long period show an astonishing humility. They realize that despite their hard work, they are fortunate to be in the position they are in. They never rest on their laurels; they work hard to keep the mission advancing. Never allow your success put a ceiling on your willingness to consider other opinions.

3)      You stop leading and start managing. Leadership is about innovation and taking people to new heights. Management is concerned with maintaining what has been achieved. While maintenance is good in and of itself, there needs to be an emphasis on progress. You not only want to keep your current success, you want to ensure continuity. Allow yourself to see new possibilities.

4)      Over-celebration. There is nothing wrong with celebrating a great milestone or accomplishment. By all means we should spare time to be happy about what we have done to get to where we are. This however becomes a problem when we fail to snap out of it in time. This is how we end up talking about our great past but have nothing noteworthy to talk about today. I always like giving the example of Apple, Samsung and Nokia especially with regard to Smartphone business. Before the advent of the smartphone, Nokia was the undisputed leader in the mobile devices industry but for some reason they missed the boat when it came to this new shift and they have never recovered. It is very difficult to think that either Apple or Samsung will fall for the same. The speed with which they move on to the next one keeps them winning. Whatever success you have enjoyed, never let it go to your head and cause you to lose sight of what the future holds. Celebrate but then quickly get back on the grind. This is the only way to keep winning. Remember the idea is not to win once but to stay winning. In his book Only the Paranoid Survive, Andy Grove says that ‘success only happens for that short time prior to the next market disruption.’ You had better not get caught napping. 

 

Growing beyond your current success.

There are a number of things you can do to move on from your success in a healthy way.

To guard against the dangers of success, Les Trachtman recommends that you need a balanced ego alongside a healthy dose of paranoia. He goes on to say that success is often the predecessor of failure. If you are not careful, your success might be the very thing that leads to your downfall.

To survive your success, you must maintain childlike curiosity, remain open-minded and pay attention to the subtle changes taking place around you. Disruptions are never obvious. They hit you like a bolt from the blue. It serves you best to appear as the foolish one and listen to new ideas. A failure to do so could lead to you biting the dust sooner rather than later.

Jen Rao in an article on fizzle.co says that it is important to look in the mirror. It’s about being self-aware whenever you are sabotaging yourself. As you see yourself and the ways in which you are sabotaging your growth, you will be in a position to act differently.

Stepping away from the success could also be immensely helpful in forging forward. While in the midst of it, it is possible to stagnate. By stepping away probably through taking some time off or looking at your success from an outsider’s perspective, you might just be able to see new windows of opportunity to move forward.

One of the other great things to do is to grow your circle of friends. When you maintain the friends you had at a lower level of success without bringing on board new friends, you are likely to start feeling like the big fish which will cause you to rest easy. Always seek to be around people who are smarter and further along the road. This has the twin effect of keeping you hungry and humble. You get to realize that there is so much more to accomplish than what you have seen so far. Super-successful friends will also show you a different way of doing things which has enabled them to get to where they are. You will be able to gain from their networks and everything they bring with them.

I will close with a famous quote from Apostle Paul, I do not consider, brethren that I have captured and made it my own yet but This one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the supreme and heavenly prize to which God in Christ is calling us upward. Philippians 3:13-14.

How are you going about managing your own success? Share in the comments so we can learn together. 

Vintage Self

 

In Pursuit of Vintage Self

There are certain times in my life where I have performed at such high levels that as I look back over I wonder what it would be if this became my daily mode of operation. Looking back at when I did very well in sales or when I was writing my first book and putting together my first course, I realize that I was in a particular state of mind that guaranteed great results. I would say that I was in a state of flow and everything was possible in those instances.  I was truly at Vintage Self. What do I mean when I talk about Vintage Self? What is vintage and what conditions do I need to meet in order to regularly get to vintage self?

Vintage is mentioned many times in relation to or denoting wine of high quality. The definition however goes beyond wine and looks at many other products. This is why we talk about Vintage cars among others. When we refer to something as vintage, we are looking at it as something from the past of high quality especially representing the best of its kind. It means something representative of the best, most distinctive and most typical. A vintage product is characterized by excellence, maturity and enduring appeal. Your vintage self therefore is the best, typical, distinctive, highest quality version of yourself. This is what you need to pursue constantly. As you look at your life, have you had moments where you produced vintage stuff in whatever compartment? Share such moments in the comments. Every time you work, serve or do whatever it is you are doing, are you delivering vintage results? Are you constantly delivering your A-game? Does what you do carry a touch of excellence, maturity and enduring appeal? Are your results memorable?

Vintage Wine

A number of conditions needs to be met if a crop is going to deliver vintage wine. The timing of different activities in the process of cultivation is critical to the success of this endeavor. The region and location where the crop is cultivated is also a factor in the success. Prevailing weather conditions during the life of the crop determine how well it will come out. The crop must also be protected from unwelcome visitors which may end up interfering with what the farmer has worked so hard to put together. What is done at harvest time also determines the final product. The bottom line is that a vintage crop is no accident. High quality wine or anything for that matter does not come about by chance. There is need for you to control the variables to ensure crop success. What variables do you need to control in your own case to ensure you are producing exemplary results?

The kind of results we are looking for might be different but there are certain conditions which we all need to meet to position ourselves where we are producing the best results. Environmental design is critical to great results (we are products of our environment), Character development (what are you made of?), Our company (The people we spend our time with), Managing distractions (focus)

Just like the right weather is needed at different times in the growth of vines to produce wine, you need to create the right environment for yourself to bring out the best results. Your environment determines how well you can concentrate on the task at hand. What kind of environment is ideal for the type of work you do? Some work well with regulated white-noise while others want total silence to function. Two people studying might require different set ups to focus on the task at hand. It is important to understand yourself and what you need to function effectively so that you prepare your environment accordingly.

Who do you need to become to produce your best results? The idea that who you are is cast in stone is a fallacy that must be dispelled. We all have capacity to grow and become the best versions of ourselves. To get to your vintage self will call on you to marshal all your capacity for growth and development. You cannot be the same person you were when you were not producing vintage results. What do you need to cut off from your life to get to your best self? What do you need to add to who you are to guarantee the best fruit? The conditions must be just right. A good crop cannot survive long in a crowded field. Character development can be likened to weeding, pruning and thinning your field. These are all activities that shake up the crop and field in serious ways. While weeding gets rid of clearly unwanted plant life, the latter two work on the plant itself. Are you ready to work on yourself and chisel your character into shape? Pruning will get rid of parts of the plant which do not add value to it. What do you need to cut off from your life because it represents zero or little value? What is competing for your resources yet it doesn’t bring added value? Same case happens with thinning. While pruning is about cutting off parts of the plant, thinning gets rid of entire plants. Are there segments/compartments of your life that need to die completely? Where and how are you willing to die in order to go to the next level? Top dressing your crop is also part of its growth process. You should look at this as the things you are adding to your character to become better. Ask yourself what you need to add to your life to deliver a vintage crop. Set yourself up for a vintage harvest by doing the right things now.

You are the sum total of the five people you spend most of your time with. 1 Corinthians 15: 33. Bad company ruins good morals. You cannot disentangle yourself from the way of life of your close confidants. If you want to experience a vintage harvest, you cannot continue to hang around people who are comfortable with average results. Reevaluate your friendships and close associations then adjust accordingly. You don’t have to cut people off completely but you can reduce contact with them while increasing contact time with those who matter to your quest. Don’t waste your precious time with those who are not adding value to your life but do not throw them under the bus unless they totally merit it. As you build connections, seek to surround yourself with people who are smarter than you. The moment you realize you are the smartest person in the room, the wise advise that you leave that room immediately. Which rooms are you leaving right now? Which new rooms do you need to enter where there are people smarter than you? As you share with others who are learning from you, see to it that you are also sitting in rooms where you are tapping from wise minds. People form part of your external environment and they have a huge impact on how your life turns out. Make sure you are surrounded by the right kind of people. This will position you where you are all set to reap a vintage harvest.

Vines are attacked by many different pests at different times. Among them are climbing cutworms, European red mites, grape berry moths, grape leafhoppers, grape phylloxera, grape root borers, grape cane gall makers, grape cane girdlers, grapevine flea beetles, Japanese beetles, red-banded leaf roller, Rose chafers and nematodes.  What pests to your focus do you need to rid yourself of? Is it Email and Social Media? Do you get distracted by colleagues who pop in and out of your office unannounced? What are you weak and wobbly around? Do you lose track of time and your goals when you get hold of that interesting Netflix series (I can relate). What steals your focus so easily? For some of us just a little setback is enough for us to throw the year away. You must learn to rise above discouragement, disappointment and disillusionment. Others suffer from shiny object syndrome. We are so focused until someone comes along with a plan that seems like what we’ve been waiting for. Right there and then, our eyes get off the goal and off we run to chase the next thrill. Too many things are present in our lives and surroundings whose aim is singular-to move us from what we need to be focused on. I love the analogy of how predators mark out their prey and focus on it to the exclusion of everything else. It doesn’t matter who else shows up along the way, once they are locked in on their target, they do not turn to the right or left until the prey is secure in their hands. To produce a vintage harvest requires extreme focus which is only possible by ruthless management of distractions.

Get set physically, mentally and emotionally. Are you in tip-top shape in these three areas? Everything hinges strongly on how you are doing here. Manage your body through great nutrition and physical exertion. Keep your mind young through constant renewal. Ensure you have a great relationship with your emotions where you don’t allow them to run wild while you are also not keeping them caged. If you are sound in these areas, everything else will take shape as needed.

I would like to help you set yourself up for a vintage year. You are welcome to join my Free Introductory Master Class where I share great insights on expressing your Vintage self. Make 2021 a Vintage Year and build on it in the years to come. WhatsApp me on +254725832477 or email asenasam@gmail.com to book your spot.