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.

Do you Love a Challenge?

 

                                                              Do you love a challenge?

Your perception around a challenge can determine what you do with it. What kind of attitude do you have towards the challenges around your life? If you ask many of us, they would rather live a life devoid of challenges. But is it possible or even worthwhile? The truth is it is impossible to live minus challenges. They are the fuel of life. It is also a mundane existence if there are no curveballs that need us to apply the best of ourselves.

Challenges create necessity. And necessity is the mother of all invention. There would be zero need for invention and innovation if there were no challenges. We advance as a race because of the constant need to deal with emerging challenges quickly enough.

Somebody had to encounter the challenge of moving swiftly from one place to another to be inspired to come up with the locomotive, the automobile and the aeroplane. Imagine what it would be like to still be travelling on foot over thousands of kilometers. Some other people thought about how inconveniencing it was to have to be in a fixed position to make calls across the world. This is how the world of cell phones came about. But that was not enough. We realized that there is a lot that we can do with a hand held device rather than just calling and texting. The need to do more with our hand held devices brought about the smartphone. The one thing that cuts across all these advancements is the presence of a challenge to be solved, a need to be met.

The best thing you can do for yourself is to fall in love with challenges. It guarantees that you will have an exciting, thrilling life. There is no greater thrill than to know you have worked on a challenge and put it to bed once and for all. Challenges make you constantly improve on your best self. Success is a journey of overcoming challenges and not just the final destination.

A life devoid of challenges is uninspiring and not something you want to constantly have. It has the potential to make you lethargic or numb. You run the risk to have a robotic experience of life which is the result of predictability. Such a life kills your imagination and creativity and leaves you high and dry. Cowards want to live where everything has been figured out for them. What kind of life is that?

Challenges do not have to be negative. Some challenges can be very positive in nature. You can create challenges for yourself for the purpose of pushing yourself to the next level. We must get into the habit of placing ourselves in situations where we crack our brains to come out of where we are stuck. Dr. Benjamin Hardy has an interesting way of looking at this. He calls them forcing functions. You need to start creating forcing functions all around you to push you further down the road. Not al your challenges need to be external and catch you by surprise. You need to get to the point where you are creating challenges for yourself and figuring them out in order to make good progress.

Think about things like making public commitments to get something done. The fact that the public is watching will spur you into doing the very best because you do not want your failure to be in the public domain. Another example of a forcing function is to get started down a road of no return. There are certain things you can do like jumping into the water which will force you to learn how to swim for survival. Many of us are capable of so much more in life but because there is no life or death situation facing us, we move at a leisurely pace. A little instability can help us adjust our pace and accomplish much more.

Challenges have a way of building our muscles. The more you encounter what you are unfamiliar with, the stronger you become both physically, mentally and psychologically. There is no shortcut to stronger muscles. The only way to strengthen is to engage in endurance training. David Goggins the renowned ex-NAVY SEAL says that our bodies start to shut down when we are only at 40 percent of their capacity in a bid to preserve themselves. The secret is to push through that resistance until you get to the other side. Once you overcome this initial resistance, you realize that you can go much further down the road.  

Question? What forcing functions are you going to apply on yourself going forward? What challenges have you been sidestepping that you are going to face going forward? I would like to hear your thoughts in the comments in this regard.

Challenges are not to be feared but embraced because in embracing your challenges, you embrace your future. Why would you run away from a better future? Your perception is much more important than the degree of challenge you are facing. If you see it as a way to grow and progress, that is exactly what it will be. If you see it as something to be avoided at all cost, then be ready for a mediocre existence at best. I am sure no one would choose a mediocre existence willingly but anytime you run away from challenges, you are slowly but surely drifting towards a mediocre life.

Would you like to learn more about being at home with challenges and how to make them work for you instead of against you? Hit me up on asenasam@gmail.com and let's talk. 

Feel free to also order a copy of my book Blessed to be a Blessing and learn more about why your experiences both good and bad, including pain are gold which you should embrace and extract value from. 

Goal Setting 2021

As we Approach 2021 for most of us it is a time to set new goals or resolutions. For others the New Year is not the best time to do this. Each camp has their own reasons. Whatever your thoughts are, I would like to encourage you to reconsider your approach to goal setting. This article will shed light on a different approach which you might want to consider next time you want to do this. 

Acceptable Goal Setting.

It has been preached to us that SMART goals are the way to go when it comes to setting goals. This has been the default approach for a long time. I have used it myself all the time I am setting goals. It is a very effective approach and some of what I am going to discuss here will still capture elements of the acronym. Let me get a few things out of the way first before I delve deeper into the discussion.

There is no changing the fact that goals must be specific. If they are not specific then they do not mean anything. They are just statements of intent. Goals must also be measurable meaning they must be quantifiable in terms of size and magnitude. I am also persuaded that goals need to be achieved within a particular set timeframe lest they become wish lists or someday items. I have a problem with attainable and realistic because they are limiting words. Goals need to stretch and scare you. Attainable and realistic mean if you stretch just a little bit you will be there. That does not excite me at all. 

Winner’s Goal Setting.

How does Grant Cardone approach his goal setting? In his book ‘The 10X Rule', he suggests setting goals 10times bigger than you normally do and be willing to do 10 times than you do. According to him, we set our goals too low and put in too little effort and end up disappointed. 

Goals need to excite us and pump up our blood. They need to scare us when we think about them and achieving them. It is when we are looking for average results and an average life that we set attainable and realistic goals. We tend to dabble in attainable and realistic because we want to fly under the radar. When you start talking big, there is no way you will fly under the radar. Everyone will be watching you. Some will even take it upon themselves to keep you accountable. The mockery you will receive from others will drive you even more. If your goals do not scare your peers, be prepared never to rise above them. 

Attainable and realistic goals guarantee that you will live beneath your potential. 95 percent of us live beneath what we are capable of. It is a case of poor stewardship of our abilities and if you are religious I bet it is sinful. Why would any of us want to live beneath our capabilities? 

The exciting way to do it is to set big goals. There is a need for a shift in mindset from us so that setting big, scary goals becomes the norm. There are many reasons for this. What we think we need turns out never to be enough courtesy of the many variables that come about. When this happens, only those who had outsized goals will weather the storm. Big goals provide enough motivation for you. They inevitably make you realize that you have to step up your activity levels. Big goals hold our attention. When they are small or attainable with little effort, we tend to lose focus and drift into other more exciting things. The bigger and more unrealistic goals are and the more aligned they are to your purpose, the more they’ll energize and fuel your actions according to Grant Cardone.

If you must follow the examples of others, then be careful about those you choose to follow. You have a responsibility to set your goals against the benchmark of those who have achieved massive success. This way the goal is so scary you are almost sure you won’t attain it. Anytime you think your goal is easily within reach, the goal is not big enough.

As you do it, realize you have been raised, educated and conditioned by restrictions. You are more conscious of what you can’t do than what you can do. From our parents to our teachers, we have been taught to think in terms of limits, to be real. Whenever we looked like going too far out of line, we were punished and brought back into the fold. We have been taught moderation which isn’t a bad thing but still comes as a limiting mindset. It is possible even your environment at work tells you to play it cool. Maybe they sneer at the very idea of ambition. With a history of limited thinking, your default approach is ‘I need to be realistic.’ This means that a lot of times we are capable of so much more. Keep this in mind as you set your own goals so that you are challenged to target higher.

Advantages of Unrealistic Goals

They help us exploit our potential more often than not. Using up our potential is often a hit and miss kind of thing. One of the surest ways to improve our odds is to set unrealistic goals and commit to massive action to realize them. 

They also have a greater reward. If I achieve 30 percent of a small goal and 30 percent of a big goal in the same area, the results and rewards are surprisingly different.

Big goals motivate. We need to be in pursuit of big things to remain focused throughout the journey.

They also cushion you from inevitable shocks. When you achieve massive success, you stand a better chance of conquering shocks that come your way from whatever quarters. 

What will you do with your current goals? Are they big enough? Do they need a fresh look? What about your team’s goals? What is your takeaway from this post? Share in the comments below.

If you need someone to walk you through setting and tracking your goals going forward, feel free to DM me or comment below. 

Share Widely.

Work it Out

The book of Philippians 2: 12-13 is a good place to start this conversation on working out your salvation. Here is what it has to say.

Therefore, my dear ones, as you have always obeyed [my suggestions], so now,
not only [with the enthusiasm you would show] in my presence but much more
because I am absent, work out (cultivate, carry out to the goal, and fully complete)
your own salvation with reverence and awe and trembling (self-distrust, with serious
caution, tenderness of conscience, watchfulness against temptation, timidly shrinking
from whatever might offend God and discredit the name of Christ).
13[Not in your own strength] for it is God Who is all the while effectually at work in you
[energizing and creating in you the power and desire], both to will and to work for His
good pleasure and satisfaction and delight.

While this scripture is specifically focused on believers living their lives in such a way as to do right with regard to honoring God and fulfilling his will, there is more to it than what we see. I would like to look at its broader application in the course of this article.

First it is important to note that the premise for this requirement is what God has already done. This is the way it always works. First, God invests in you then he seeks the return. He will never seek a return where he has not invested.

God works in you as we see in verse 13 to have both the willingness and the ability to do what He is asking for in verse 12. There are two things which stand in the way of someone who wants to do something good. For some it is a lack of willingness. You lack the drive, the impetus, the motivation to go out and do something. The second challenge we see is the ability. In a world where the default setting is for us to do wrong, it takes superhuman ability to go out and do the right thing. God takes care of both issues and positions us where we have all it takes to work things out.

If we are to look at its broader application, this scripture is encouraging us to make the most of God’s supplied graces upon our lives. There are many investments God has put in us, many things he has endowed us with. We have talent, abilities, gifts and so much more that is already resident in us. The question becomes what to do with it all. If you look deep within yourself you realize that there is a lot that lies unexploited. Working it out is about choosing to bring it all to the fore.

Your endowments help no one when they stay hidden or under the radar. They only find their significance when they are given room to shine through. Our job as we live this side heaven is to ensure that all our reserves are deployed for the benefit of all. We must endeavor to tap into all our reservoirs of energy to ensure that we are not living anything unutilized or underutilized.

When we fail to work out our potential, we are guilty of one or all three things. We are either misusing, underusing or not using at all. John C. Maxwell says where purpose is unknown, abuse is inevitable. Therefore there is a number of things we need to do if we are to get to the point where we are fully making use of what we have at our disposal. These three things are the heart and soul of what we do at Optimize Institute. I will briefly go into them as we come to a close of this article.

I call them the 3D’s of your potential and they stand for Discover, Develop, Deploy.

The first task you have as an individual if you are to work out your potential is to discover it. You cannot exploit what you don’t know. Your eyes must be open to what you have lying within you if you will have a chance to exploit it. That awareness is critical. You need to look deep within yourself as you also search the scriptures to get a clearer understanding of what lies within you. I am of the persuasion that the God who made you understands clearly what is wired within you much like automotive engineers know what lies under the hood of a supercar. There is therefore no better place to start looking than to consult with Him in prayer and in His word. He could give greater meaning to your experiences than what you thought possible. He can weave a good narrative out of the chaos of your life than you could come up with by yourself. Discovery is not complete without the involvement of the divine.

Secondly you must develop that latent power lying within. There is a lot that your gifts need before they can shine through. I always say, you must look at your gifts as diamonds in the rough. There is a process through which they are taken before they are ready to make beautiful ornaments. That process is what we are calling development. Development requires that you go through the fire and the water. It will call for you to endure the ups and downs of life, there will be highs and lows at every turn. Sometimes you will feel like quitting along the way because the heat is too much. At other times you will wonder whether it is all worth it. The process of development is no walk in the park but it is a necessary component of the journey to bringing it all to the fore.

Finally you are ready for deployment. After all the ups and downs, the time is right for you to be made manifest to the world. Many times, the people see you and marvel at what has happened overnight. While it feels like an overnight success to them, for you who has gone through the process, it’s been tedious beyond explanation. At the point of deployment you are up for celebration. Everybody wants to be associated with you. Even those who were on the sidelines want to find a way to show solidarity with you. They say failure is an orphan but success has many fathers. You must learn to take it in your stride because there is nothing much you can do to change people.  To work it out means you have endured the process of development and allowed yourself to reach the limelight. The Joy of deployment far exceeds the pains of development every time. It is much like how for the joy of holding her baby in her hands, the mother forgets all the pain of childbirth.

No matter what stage you are at in the process, remain focused on the final goal which is to see the fruit of all your labor. The reward is not for those who quit along the way. It is reserved for those are ready to go all the way to the top. They say the air at the top is pure because the top is less crowded. If you want to enjoy that kind of air, then you have your job cut out for you. Beyond the reward however, do it from a sense of duty and responsibility because one of my favorite quotes is that ‘The world, God and you need the best of you expressed.’ When you fail to show up, everybody suffers. Therefore show up for the good of everyone who is waiting on you. 

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Improve on your best

 

Get into the habit of pushing the boundaries of what you can handle. Everything around us evolves constantly. What was great yesterday is considered trash today. The people who will remain relevant must change with the changing times and circumstances. While you rest easy enjoying your success, your problems are evolving. Improvement is required just to maintain your position before you even think of taking steps forward.

If you are in business, you will realize that your competitors are working very hard to close the gap between you and them. If you don’t work on getting better at what you are doing you will soon find yourself as a success story of the past. I constantly refer to smartphone manufacturers as the greatest example of improving on your best. For the better part of the decade 2001-2010, Nokia was the king when it came to manufacturing cutting edge phones that always surprised us with what they were capable of doing. At some point it looked as though they had a new phone out every week. Word has it that they had the technology to produce the first smartphones but they slept on it concluding for some reason that the world was not ready for this kind of technology. Since that time, it has never been the same for them again. The moment they missed the bus, they started going downhill. Several attempts later and they still can’t boast of any significant market share in the smartphone business despite having some great options along the way. Contrast that with what has happened at Apple and Samsung. People are so invested in what these two companies produce, that they line up well in advance to get their hands on the latest iteration of their flagship devices. They are sure to sell millions of devices across the globe every year. The thing that keeps them at the top of people’s minds is the fact that they come with the latest technology available. Their R and D teams have little time to celebrate the success of what came out last year. They almost immediately go back to asking themselves: what can we offer the market next year to beat what they currently have in their hands? In short they are keen on improving on their best.

In his acceptance speech for an Academy Award, Actor Matthew McConaughey made an outstanding statement that reflects what it means to improve on your best. He said that his hero is always 10 years ahead of him. In essence his hero is who he is going to be ten years from now. That means he is always chasing a better version of himself. The way he sees himself now as great as it is, he knows that his future self, is bound to be better than his present self and that is why he keeps chasing his hero. Another example from the incredible Dr. Benjamin Hardy is from onetime Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice. Her mantra is that she never refers to herself as the ‘Former’ anything. She focuses much more on what the future has in store for her that she has no time to get lost in thinking of who she was in a former role. That right there is the thinking of someone who is given to doing better and focusing on the improvement they can still reach rather than any greatness in their past.

However well you are doing at the present moment, it is important to realize that you are still a work in progress. You must constantly keep your eyes open to see the opportunities accorded you for improvement and to do better. That is the basis for living a great life. I am a strong proponent of living optimally and constant improvement can never be separated from the pursuit of an optimal life. The fact that you are excelling today should keep you on your toes. At some point, you are no longer in the zone of competing with others. Your competition becomes the pursuit of beating who you were yesterday. Grant Cardone in his masterpiece The 10X Rule has a chapter on Competition where he says that your goal needs to be domination rather than competition. He says that while others are pursuing best practices, you need to be in a place where you are pursuing ‘only practices.’ By the time you reach here, you are not only improving constantly on your best self but playing in a one man league where you are constantly assured you will win.

Would you do with someone to hold your hand in the pursuit of improving on your best? If your answer is in the affirmative, then talk to me on +254725832477/ samuelmwinamoa@gmail.com

Your Best Foot Forward

Do your best

If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.     

Colin Powell

Aim to work at the peak of your abilities. Excellence is the mark of someone who wants to be at the top of their game in whatever area of life. It is a lofty ambition that shouldn’t be taken lightly. A majority of the people are comfortable with good enough. Little do we realize that good enough keeps us from the best. Nobody is called to do just good enough. We are required to constantly put our best foot forward.

If you had a choice between two doctors  or service providers in whatever industry and you got to know that one gives exceptional service while the other one does just the bare minimum., is there doubt about who you would want to serve you?

Excellence is a virtue espoused in God’s word. God’s word tells us Colossians 3:23 Whatever you do whether in word or deed, do it with all your heart. Do it as unto the Lord and not as unto men. I do not care what your religion is or who you hold in the highest esteem. One thing I know is that you will always give the best when dealing with that person you esteem highly. Assume that you are serving the President of your Republic, doesn’t it go without saying that you will want to give your very best? Now that should be your attitude and approach irrespective of who you are serving. You need to be known for the thoroughness with which you do things. Resist the temptation to be average or at worst mediocre. Instead endeavor to deliver great results every time you are tasked with something. Make excellence your trademark and you will never run out of people to serve.

So what is excellence if we are to delve deeper into the conversation?

Dictionary.com defines excellence as the fact or state of excelling; superiority; eminence. Among the synonyms given for the word excellence are preeminence, distinction, transcendence, merit and virtue.

The Collins dictionary defines it as the state or quality of excelling or being exceptionally good; extreme merit; superiority. We are talking about something being of high quality.

The idea is that to pursue excellence means you are not willing to settle for the ordinary. You are committed to giving that which is outstanding and beyond expectation. You are not here just to participate, you are here to excel. Upon you is the ability to be the very best at what you do. Most of the time, we just haven’t made up our minds that we want to excel. Some of us do not want to commit to excellence because it can be very demanding. When you think about it though, you realize that a lot of the hurt we see around us is because somebody chose to be sloppy about their job. A lousy father or mother will bring up children who are a problem to the society. A sloppy engineer will oversee projects that will collapse and cause injuries or loss of life. A doctor who does just good enough will inevitably lose patients who would have survived if handled better. A lousy teacher/lecturer will churn out half-baked graduates who need extra training before they are useful in the marketplace. I could go on and on but I know you get the picture. Think about the consequences of doing your job minus that pursuit for excellence. Who is likely to suffer? What is likely to go wrong? When you answer these questions honestly, you will ditch your pleasure and begin to put your best foot forward.

In a world of extreme competition, an excellent approach to anything you are doing sets you apart from the crowd. Anyone who excels at what they do, has people beating a path to their door. I saw someone comparing what Cristiano Ronaldo earns to what scientists and researchers earn and feeling that there is a discrepancy. The argument was: what is the value that Ronaldo brings compared to what scientists can do with regard to finding solutions to COVID 19? The feeling was that what the researchers do is highly valuable and they should be compensated more. I agree with this reasoning to a certain extent but I have a different view as well. Whereas everybody needs to be compensated well and relative to their contribution, there is also the reality that in every field some people stand head and shoulders above the rest. For every Cristiano Ronaldo, there are thousands of footballers who are struggling to make ends meet. In the same breath for the thousands of poorly remunerated researchers there are a few who earn very highly. The reason is that they are perceived as highly valuable in their respective fields. One of the things that increases your perceived value in the marketplace, is the excellence with which you carry out your duties or responsibilities. You see Ronaldo excels at entertaining football fans with what he can do on the field of play. Truth be told we rank entertainment very highly; perhaps more highly than we ought to but it is what it is. Those scientists who earn more than others also have something outstanding about them. And I argue that among other things, they execute their roles with a spirit of excellence which is a tall order for a majority of those who complain about discrepancies. To put it lightly, for every Kempinski, there are thousands of Kibandaskis. People choose Kempinski because of the attention to detail and what goes into delivering that experience. It’s not about the food per se because it’s no different at the Kibandaski, it’s the quality of the delivery that determines where people flow to.

Excellence is a journey. You must make up your mind that you will not give anything less than the best every single day as you step out. You do not have to wait for anything or anyone. You must start right where you are in your pursuit for excellence. If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work. Thomas J. Watson.

Like breathing, you need to cultivate it until it becomes second nature. The more you work at it, the more you will see room to get better. When you become complacent, you lose your ability to improve and settle for something less than the best.

Excellence brings with it a number of benefits including an increase in your confidence and self-esteem. There is an appreciation you have for yourself when you know you gave your best to your tasks. It also earns you recognition and praise. You cannot hide excellent work. It has a way of rising to the top. People take note of anyone who is going above and beyond. With recognition comes reward and promotion. Opportunities keep flowing in the way of those who are excelling at their current station. Excellence glorifies God. When we do well, it reflects well on our Creator because we have brought the best attributes within us.

I will wrap it up with a quote from Aristotle. ‘Excellence is never an accident. It is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, and intelligent execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives - choice, not chance, determines your destiny.     

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You want to go deeper into the excellence conversation? Hit me up on WhatsApp +254725832477 or Email: samuelmwinamoa@gmail.com

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