Revisiting Excellence
You did it. It’s almost the end of January.
Has it felt like a long one?
We did so much to prepare ourselves for this month and get motivated for the year - and boy, has it been a year already.
I was reflecting on some writing I did a few years back and wanted to bring this one out of the archives for you:
What the GOAT OSC is Made Of
Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignor…
There’s not much I would change about how I talked about our role. The cognitive lift and technical problem-solving we do all day, every day, is what makes us unique.
Give it a read when you’ve got a few minutes. I’d love to know if it resonates.
This week, I want to examine the word excellence.
As a dear friend always says: “words matter”. Is this a word you would choose for the person you show up as every day?
Excellence Defined
Put simply, to be excellent is to be outstanding at something. I think so many things can drive a person but the pursuit of excellence might be up there as a top driver in our careers and workplaces.
It also has to be coupled with learning.
Excellence happens when we commit to being a forever student of our craft. Excellence is forever a moving target and it evolves as we master each stage.
Last month I was in a client meeting and we discussed the evolution of their business. Once, they were mastering the craft of building, then they were mastering operations, then it became figuring out how to be a sales organization, and now, mastering communication.
That was such a poignant example of how we grow. We begin focused on one small thing and get excellent at it. Then we move on and go through the entire process again.
Why Choose Excellence
An expectation of excellence holds you to the highest standard. If you walk into every situation expecting excellence you’re going to change how you operate.
By choosing to be excellent no matter what happens in the situation you’re energetically shifting the experience.
Every single time someone calls in and you pick up the phone to answer, do you stop to refresh your tone or attitude? That’s choosing excellence. That’s choosing to put your best foot forward.
Every single time you pull up a profile you' haven’t engaged recently, do you say, “I’d better give them a call and see how they are?” - when you could just text or shoot off an email template? That’s choosing excellence and it’s choosing what’s best for the customer.
Choosing excellence means you’re giving it your all, every single time.
It’s not being perfect. It’s an active choice.
Excellence in Failure
You can choose excellence when it doesn’t go well either. You can choose how you’re going to engage with the issue and change it going forward. That makes you resilient. That makes you bold.
You can seek blame in others. But owning the problem, seeing the lesson, and moving the situation forward has far greater power.
Excellence is a practice. It’s starting fresh in every situation and knowing yourself so well that you can sense when ego emerges and know how to dismantle it.
When we remove our ego we become our best professional version of ourselves. We begin the service side of our role.
You can be excellent, every single day.
Embrace the role you are lucky to be in and seek excellence in all you do. I promise, it’ll change everything.
