No One Gives Grades for Effort Anymore
I remember the exact moment I knew I wanted to be an electrical engineer. I was in my junior year of high school working alongside five of my peers wiring a board out of AND, OR, and NOT chips to make a 555 timer (this was before I know that all of that could have been replaced by a single 8 pin chip, but I digress). It was a rat race to finish the wiring and complete the timing device first and I was leading the pack – even ahead of the would-be valedictorian of my class. I was in my element and could taste victory… then the valedictorian proceeded to beat me in creating the 555 timer by a few minutes.
At some point in our lives, we reach a point where our skills needed to be tweaked, updated with the times, or completely uprooted to suit the needs of our career. Far too often I hear “I tried” at work and then I can’t help but wonder what they are going to do to persevere. That’s when I realize, whenever my peer, coworker, manager, leader says “I tried…,” it is an admission of giving up. There is no intent to pick up and try again or to look up alternative suggestions or obtain a third party perspective. They’ve already pegged it as a loss and want to move on to perhaps another low hanging fruit that they can claim a quick success on. We have to face that sometimes not even a win can wash away the latest disappointment – and if you choose not to endure the letdowns to achieve the eventual results more often than not, I believe you should reconsider your position.
Buck up buttercup.
True leaders don’t just face the mistakes they’ve made – they pivot and find eventual victory. It may not take the same shape as the original goal, but they find the point of compromise that everyone can work with. Businesses can’t thrive if everyone merely “tries,” there has to be tangible results. Businesses need to stop giving managers second and third and fourth chances to be leaders who can’t or don’t lead. The risk is too great to pretend that people in managerial positions can afford the luxury of trying repeatedly and stay in place. Individual contributors are the ones that suffer most when the captain of the ship is just chilling on a beach somewhere – not guiding the ship that they were appointed to be on! That does not drive accountability. If you cannot tweak or adjust your style to meet business conditions, the team you are leading, or optimize productivity of the team – you need to take a moment to evaluate if you should lead that team.
Buck up buttercup.
The teacher disclosed to the class that the guy was there after school for a week on it, and repeatedly ripped everything out of the board to restart several times. Despite him claiming victory, I still feel like the real winner given my results with much less effort. Oh well – buck up buttercup.