-Regional Director at National Non-Profit Agency
I have to be an expert in all things concerning my product and the competing products if I am a salesperson. I have to be an expert in accounting if I am an accountant. I have to be an expert in commercial lending if I am a commercial lender.
What about leaders? If I am leading salespeople, accountants or commercial lenders, do I need to be as up to date as my people? Continue Reading…
The world is full of self-important, self-absorbed, and self-promoting people. I prefer humble people. They are truly a breath of fresh air when I meet them.
Humility seems to be a virtue that is losing ground in today’s world. Humble people do not make for good TV. The media prefers to make the bold and the brash the lead story. These are the people who make the headlines.
The bravado superstars show on Sportscenter or CEO’s demonstrate on MSNBC or Fox News makes for good ratings. I just don’t think it makes for very good people. Continue Reading…
I spent a long time believing that if I was good at something, I needed to tell people about it. I thought it was a sign of confidence. Looking back, I realize I turned a lot of people off with that attitude.
Few people would argue that confidence is not an important trait for successful individuals and leaders to possess. But like many positive traits, confidence out of control can be a weakness. I had to learn that confidence and humility can coexist in the same person. Continue Reading…
Some people are joy suckers. They can enter any situation and suck the fun right out of the room. It is a gift really. A gift I appreciate as much as a good case of pink eye. The unfortunate thing is, a bad attitude is just as contagious.
We can all have off days. This is not what I am talking about. I am talking about people who choose to have a bad attitude on a consistent basis. A bad attitude is a choice. I discussed that in: Your Attitude Is A Choice: Make A Different Choice.
But what is the cornerstone issue someone is dealing with? What does that person need to change to become a joyful person versus a joy sucker? They need less - self.
I love sports. I love youth sports. I love what sports teaches kids. Unfortunately, youth sports can also be a place where young athletes are exposed to the wrong lessons in life.
A previous post on this page even addresses another aspect of youth sports: trophies. But a new phenomenon in youth sports makes me crazy. Placing young athletes at street corners to beg for financial support! Continue Reading…
Have you ever returned from vacation and not felt rested? Is it the activities? The travel involved? The people you are vacationing with? Or perhaps it is how many days you take off from vacation.
That was my problem. I discovered a way to ensure I got real rest on vacation. Here is my thought process on vacation. Try it and see if you don’t come back more rested.
Below is the You Tube video to David McCullough Jr.’s speech to the graduating Class of 2012 at Wellesley High School. This is an in your face yet inspiring speech to the coming generation.
His last words to them are about being selfless. Being selfless is truly the most likely way any of us will become special.
Exercise free will and creative, independent thought not for the satisfactions they will bring you, but for the good they will do others, the rest of the 6.8 billion–and those who will follow them. And then you too will discover the great and curious truth of the human experience is that selflessness is the best thing you can do for yourself. The sweetest joys of life, then, come only with the recognition that you’re not special.
You see, if everyone is special, then no one is. If everyone gets a trophy, trophies become meaningless. In our unspoken but not so subtle Darwinian competition with one another–which springs, I think, from our fear of our own insignificance, a subset of our dread of mortality — we have of late, we Americans, to our detriment, come to love accolades more than genuine achievement. We have come to see them as the point — and we’re happy to compromise standards, or ignore reality, if we suspect that’s the quickest way, or only way, to have something to put on the mantelpiece, something to pose with, crow about, something with which to leverage ourselves into a better spot on the social totem pole.
No longer is it how you play the game, no longer is it even whether you win or lose, or learn or grow, or enjoy yourself doing it… Now it’s “So what does this get me?” As a consequence, we cheapen worthy endeavors, and building a Guatemalan medical clinic becomes more about the application to Bowdoin than the well being of Guatemalans.
-David McCullough Jr. Wellesley High School 2012 Commencement Speech
I read the text from a commencement address given at Wellesley High School by David McCullough Jr. this weekend. The truth in it is hard to argue with. The brilliance of the prose floored me.
His message, simply stated was, “You are not special.” Some may say it is a harsh message to hear on graduation. But I ask you, when were they going to hear it? In 18 years these seniors probably never had!
I have met way too many bosses, peers, and job seekers who I know never heard that message. We all need to hear it. I know I did. You do too. Trust me. Sometimes it hurts to be reminded, I AM NOT SPECIAL. But pain can be helpful in learning. Continue Reading…
I spend a lot of time in the bleachers at my kids sporting events. I love it. I am a gym rat who loves to watch both practice and games. It is one of my favorite things from my childhood that I did with my dad, The Master of The Sword at West Point.
Sometimes as I sit in the bleachers, I witness something that makes my blood boil. I witness a kid dismiss a coach’s advice. They give the coach that “whatever” look or in some cases even verbalize their bad attitude.
I want to jump out of the stands and shake them. I want to say, “Who are you to question someone who played the game you’re playing and has been teaching the game to hundred’s before you!”
What arrogance! What stupidity! It’s just dumb kids though right? Unfortunately, I have seen the same attitude in adults at work, in ministry, and in other areas of life.
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