The First Ingredient
Over the past three months, I've spoken to a bunch of organizations and a handful of conferences on "the relentless pursuit of excellence." I've also worked some of that content into the blog and podcast. This has inevitably resulted in people reaching out to me to ask about how to pursue excellence in their own endeavors. These are similar conversations I have with my clients, too. Typically, people want to know what tactics or strategies would help them become more excellent:
Should I increase my marketing budget?
Do I need to hire a manager?
Do my wife and I need to set up a budget?
Should I pay off my car loan?
Would it help to work longer hours?
Should I ask my boss for a promotion?
Tactics and strategies. All of these things can be good things, but they overlook the first ingredient: a genuine care to become better. A little care goes a long ways.....especially today. We live in a world full of apathy, disinterest, and complacency. If we're not careful, we can start to behave like the masses.
We need to care. Correction: we need to find things we genuinely care about.
When I found myself in debt trouble in my late 20s, I developed a deep care not to repeat the pain and suffering I experienced.
After Sarah and I got together, we developed a deep care to find freedom and margin in our hopefully-growing family.
In my prior career, I developed a deep care to serve my clients well and steward the huge sums of money they entrusted to us.
Over these past 7+ years of creating content and coaching families and businesses, I've developed a deep care to help people find meaning and purpose around work and money.
Since we opened Northern Vessel, I've developed a deep care for creating world-class hospitality at a level never before seen in the coffee industry.
Until we care, practically no tactic or strategy will help us become excellent. I'll occasionally do a poor job at judging prospective coaching clients. Then, in our first or second meeting, I'll realize they aren't ready yet. They haven't yet developed a deep care to become excellent. Thus, nothing I do will actually help them. That first ingredient of care moves the needle far more than we can imagine.
If there's an area you want to become excellent in, ask yourself, "Do I really care enough to invest in this pursuit?" If the answer is no, we need to dig deeper to find it. Or, we might need to experience another few rounds of pain and suffering to shock it into us. But if the answer is yes, and you are ready, start moving forward. Yes, tactics and strategies will help, but just start moving forward. That genuine care, in and of itself, will help give you momentum in the right direction.
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