Part 4 of 5
Editor’s Note: Follow Bharat’s entire Life Lessons Series HERE
Consistency in your efficiency improvement initiatives is an absolutely essential building block, no matter how you cut it. Any slackness will lead you to a slippery slope from where recovery is almost next to impossible. Businesses, rather successful businesses, devote large chunks of their budget to Innovation, R&D, Employee Training Programs, Consulting Services as well as outside experts to harness the power of everyday changes throughout the business environment around the globe.
Successful entrepreneurs understand, appreciate and emulate the discipline so fiercely practiced by the armed forces even during peace time as they know the consequences of being caught unawares. Their level of consistency with discipline of a soldier does not necessarily sit well with the entire rank and file, still their inner strength empowers them to convey a strong message: ‘Duty Comes Before Rights’! It is this specific trait that helps them overcome employees’ weaknesses and instil the sense of pride attained as a result of a job well done.
Their continued progress backed by strict discipline, combined with an unhindered focus on the goal keeps them from getting sidetracked. Yes, you must find time to recapitulate your steps and acknowledge the progress at regular intervals. It goes a long way in maintaining proper course through thick and thin.
One particular system I have found to be absolutely phenomenal in this respect is to divide your journey into easier steps. When you decide to get from point ‘A’ to point ‘Z’, please do not forget the other twenty-four stops on the way (within a total of 26 alphabets). If you want to make your journey comfortable, you will group these twenty-four steps into four or six smaller or easier-to-achieve-targets e.g. group 1 containing B, C, D, E, F, and G.
Such a technique, when employed in a harmonious fashion i.e. keeping various employees’ specific work ethics and capabilities in mind, will make your job of managing much easier. In addition, you will still hold all the aces in your hands because making changes, additions/alterations and/or scheduling become secondary rather than primary concern.
Depending upon the size of your organization, you could even build synergy by allocating smaller modules of the same project to different divisional teams (to address their specific fields of expertise) at the same time, so it could all fit together into the BIGGER PICTURE soon completed. Once you have achieved the first target, your victory will smell sweet and it will be your reward for keeping on track. It is this combination of easier targets and lofty goals that will bring a quantum change not only in your life style but also that of those that depend upon you for their livelihood.
One of the very simple and often overlooked formulas for success is to build upon your strengths (like they say: put your best foot forward) and to overcome your weaknesses. The biggest tragedy of human nature is that we hate to admit our weaknesses in front of others. It is in this same endeavor that we also try to find friends of our own ilk. Many a times we are scared to make friends with people from more affluent background for fear that we may not fit their culture.
It is not my intention to coax everyone into making friends with people way above their social or financial status. On the contrary, you should never feel small just because you are not so well endowed financially or socially. So long as you have a good, balanced head over your shoulders and the power to know from right or wrong, you are at least as competent, if not more, as any one else from a rich or luxurious background. When it comes to competence, there are no lines drawn and no single individual and/or background has exclusivity over success.
“That some achieve great success is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.” Abraham Lincoln the 16th President of United States of America from March 1861 to April 1865 gave us these words of wisdom from his own experiences gleaned from a very difficult and deprived childhood. He did not have the luxury of proper schooling for a career and was mostly self-taught.
If a young kid, deprived of very basic necessities of life could achieve such a tremendous amount of success and get rid of every imaginable weakness to be at the head of a Global Super Power, what deters you from picking up the gauntlet and making a dash for success like your life depended upon it?
Your answer to your inner conscience will determine where you see your success and how you plan on getting there. The steps are simple but not easy, challenging and strenuous but studded with GLORY that will make you and your loved ones chuckle with pride!
TRY IT, YOU MIGHT LIKE IT…