A combination of recent events has had me thinking more about the expectations we have for ourselves, our kids, our employees and holy moly, even our politicians.
First, Jim Rohn passed away a few weeks ago. That loss got it started.
Jim talked a lot about expectations and how delivery of them is on one person – you. I highly recommend following his advice. While you can buy his stuff, quite a lot can be found at no cost on his site and on YouTube.
Next, four of my Scouts attained the rank of Eagle last Saturday, after progressing together in Scouting since the second grade. Three of them had been Life Scouts (the last rank prior to Eagle) for over three years. They needed a little prodding to finish that last item on their checklist.
But one just didn’t think he could get there. Not because he isn’t confident, but because the mountain in front of him was so tall.
A year ago, he was a Star Scout. That means that he needed several merit badges, needed to spend six months actively providing leadership to the troop, had to finish the requirements for the Life Scout rank, and had to come up with an Eagle Scout service project.
All of that had to happen in about a year, and with a dose of reality, it had to happen in an environment that includes a job, his senior year of high school, cars, girls, school, skiing, hunting and everything else teenagers do these days.
One thing that I’ve found with folks young and not so young is that the size of the mountain in front of them rarely has anything to with their ability to climb it.
What’s far more important is whether or not they THINK they can climb it.
Yeah, I know…I’m teetering into the land of the touchy-feely. However, what folks think they can make happen clearly has a huge impact on what they accomplish.
For that one young man, it was easy to seem like Eagle wasn’t reachable because it was so far away.
All he needed was to see that *I* completely believed he could do it if he applied himself. I didn’t do the work, I didn’t give him any shortcuts, and I sure don’t deserve the credit, but that little tiny bump in the road could have kept him from getting there.
Once he believed he could get over it, he simply had to chip away at it till he was done.
I wonder how many of those little bumps and “You can’t do that” comments employees, business owners and entrepreneurs run into and what accomplishments they prevent.
Some people would see a comment like that as a challenge. They’ll swing for the fences and complete the task with a flourish (think “Ricky Henderson“) as a way to say “Oh yeah? Take THAT. I *could* do it.”
Most business owners and entrepreneurs probably steamroll past that stuff or they wouldn’t be in those positions. But… not everyone is built that way. It might take a success or two to show some that they really can kick butt and take names even when the mountain is big.
I spend a lot of time with kids due to Scouts, swim team and other things I’m involved in. I sometimes see kids who are told they *are* great (whether they are or not) rather than encouraging them to *be* great (or even better) and accomplish great things.
More kids need to be encouraged to BE great, whether they want to be a rocket scientist, a millwright or a statesman (“statesperson” sounds too weird for me). We could use a few (hundred) *great* ones.
T-Minus 16 days
Here’s a little ToDo for you as you get ready for 2010:
- Write down the 10 most important things your business needs to accomplish in 2010.
- Make sure those 10 are seriously part of the big picture vision you have for your business – whatever that might be.
- Now the hard part. Pick the item that is *the most important* thing to accomplish.
- Finally, write down every task that has to be completed to make it happen.
- Get to work.
Want to learn more about Mark or ask him to write about a business, operations or marketing problem? See Mark’s site or contact him via email at mriffey at flatheadbeacon.com.