Why Try To Get Out Of Your Box, When You Can Use What's In It?
The ruckus makers doing meaningful work and changing our culture for the better; their lean in speed is lightening fast.
If there’s an issue, they lean in. If there’s a relationship to build, they lean in. If there’s a wall to climb, they lean in. And quick.
The opposite, of course, results in banality, lack of feelings of fulfillment and busy work.
Stay Positive & Don’t Lean Back, Lean In
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You can lend a hand when someone is in need. Maybe their problem is having to get all of their stuff into a moving truck. Maybe they’re having relationship issues. Maybe they bought too much beer and can use some help drinking it.
Moments when lending a hand can be a difference maker are pretty obvious.
The not-so-obvious is when a story is what’s needed.
The teacher that’s breaking curriculum to help a student follow their passion needs to do more than lend a hand, she needs to lend a story; to herself, to the student, and likely to the board and the student’s parents.
The project manager that needs to keep a project moving. They don’t need an extra set of hands; they need to lend a story to those working on the project that motivates them, a story to the stakeholders that are wanting the project done yesterday, a story to themselves about resilience and determination.
There are times that a lending hand can help, but far more often a story can help more.
Stay Positive & What Story Are You Lending?
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If it’s easy for them to provide feedback, it’s probably not feedback worth acting on.
If it’s easy for them to complete the task, it’s probably not a task worth investing in (unless the investment is in how to automate the easy task).
We’ve made it too easy for critics, busy work, and poor investments to take hold.
If it’s hard for you to move on from what’s easy, then it’s a move worth making.
Stay Positive & Find The Hard Things Worth Listening To, Acting In And Building Unto
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To get your return, it takes more than cash.
It takes attention to detail and emotional labor and rallying a tribe around your investment.
It takes work to get the return.
If you’re telling yourself (or others are telling you) that you can get ahead by putting some of your resources in a bucket and then do nothing after – they’re wrong more than they’re right.
Significantly more times wrong.
Stay Positive & Get Ready To Do Some Work (Worth Doing)
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Awards, success, remarkability isn’t gained by being excellent at one single thing.
Nor is it about being successful in a variety.
But being skilled at a cluster of actions and ways of thinking can be a difference maker.
More of a zone situation than a lane. More of a honeycomb than a bullseye.
Stay Positive & Focus Your Gains In The Cluster Where It Matters
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There are a lot of metrics you can report on. A lot of spectrums you can measure. A lot of observation you can report on.
But if action items don’t follow each mention of a metric; they’re not worth measuring.
Stay Positive & Measure The Meaningful
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First you need to love what you do. Love creating. Love posting and sharing.
Then you’ve gotta delete; to see it as a quantity game. The more ideas around what you love, the more ideas get removed – with a few great ones carrying on.
And then we repeat. We create more. Ideate more. Ship more.
Each time, weaning out the weak, promoting the best and mastering our craft.
Stay Positive & Enjoy The Cycle
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