A Quest for Excellence
August 10th, 2009 Posted in Newsletter
This past Tuesday night I had the opportunity to speak to the Atlanta Falcons football team. Head Coach Mike Smith had all his players and coaches read Training Camp before I arrived. As I walked into their locker-room and training complex I was happy to see our 20 Ways to Get Mentally Tough and 11 Traits of the Best of the Best posters posted all around as a testimony to how the team is embracing the message. Even more encouraging and humbling was having the players come up after my talk to share how they benefited from the book. One of the things many of the players commented on from my talk is a lesson I’d like to share with you in this newsletter today.
There is a difference between success and excellence.
Success is often measured by comparison to others. Excellence, on the other hand, is all about being the best we can be and maximizing our gifts, talents and abilities to perform at our highest potential.
We live in a world that loves to focus on success and loves to compare. We are all guilty of doing this. However, I believe that to be our best we must focus more on excellence and less on success. We must focus on being the best we can be and realize that our greatest competition is not someone else but ourselves.
For example, coaching legend John Wooden often wouldn’t tell his players who they were playing each game. He felt that knowing the competition was irrelevant. He believed that if his team played to the best of their ability they would be happy with the outcome. In fact, John Wooden never focused on winning. He had his team focus on teamwork, mastering the fundamentals, daily improvement and the process that excellence requires. As a result he and his teams won A LOT.
A focus on excellence was also the key for golfing legend Jack Nicklaus. His secret was to play the course not the competition. He simply focused on playing the best he could play against the course he was playing. While others were competing against Jack, he was competing against the course and himself.
The same can be said for Apple’s approach with the iPod and iPhone. When they created these products they didn’t focus on the competition. Instead they focused on creating the best product they could create. As a result, rather than measuring themselves against others they have become the measuring stick.
We have a choice as individuals, organizations and teams. We can focus on success and spend our life looking around to see how our competition is doing, or we can look straight ahead towards the vision of greatness we have for ourselves and our teams. We can look at competition as the standard or as an indicator of our progress towards our own standards. We can chase success or we can embark on a quest for excellence and focus 100% of our energy to become our best… and let success find us.
Ironically, when our goal is excellence the outcome and byproduct is often success.
Stay Positive!
- Jon
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Tags: jon gordon, Newsletter, positive, quest for excellence, success
9 Responses to “A Quest for Excellence”
By Rick Gagnon on Aug 10, 2009
Thank you for tha tinspiring note Jon. I am about to join a meeting where I am attempting to convince Product Management that we should adopt a certain standard for safety labels for our products but they are concerned about how it will look and how it weill look in comparison to that of our competition. I will use your words to try and convince Product Management that we need to do what is best for us and not compare to what the competition is doing. More to follow.
By Bill Morrison on Aug 10, 2009
As a former competitive intelligence manager in the Fortune 200 arena, I see the relevance in the ’success’ vs ‘excellence’ ideals against a competition background. In fact, one component of analyzing yourself against competition is “benchmarking” best practices of said competition.
However, does that truly allow for innovative thought and direction? Or does it mimic best practices?
Still, not focusing on the competition at some point puts you in danger of operating in a vacuum. The merging of the two thoughts might be to examine truly innovative approaches with competitors, but customize and elevate your own level of excellence–grounded in your own ideals.
By Joan Olejniczak on Aug 10, 2009
I believe competition can sometimes hinder excellence. Take the little brother who trys to be like his big brother in sports. In trying so hard to become his brother, he is missing an opprotunity to excel at something he truly loves. Therefore, excellence will never be obtained in sports (not his true love) and it will not be obtained in the other area, due to the competitive push to focus on sports.
By Paula Varns on Aug 10, 2009
I agree with the point of your message Jon. I believe what we/I focus on is important. What I have to ask is what is your definition of success? The definition of success will vary depending on who you talk to. For some success is creating a joyful fulfilled life. For some success is making a lot of money, while for some being the best parent is success.
Reading your article I am interpreting success as winning the game. While focusing on excellence is being the best you can be and delivering to the best of your abilities in the given moment.
Thank you for your message and for reminding me to deliver my best and to strive for excellence.
By George Chapas on Aug 11, 2009
By defining success as achieving the goals we set for the event or practice in which we are participants will create the excellence we seek in our lives. In sports I believe we teach players to achieve, reach, try not to be complacent with where we are today. To achieve success, today’s practice is better than yesterdays. Ever time we practice a skill during drills the second is better than first, the third time better than the second.
The largest room in the world is the room for improvement. By practicing and believeing in this philosphy we can achieve excellence in sports, personal and proffessional lives. Daily we all achieve & experience different levels of success in all the task we undertake.
Champions demonstrate a will to succeed (win)by sacraficing and demonstrating a will to prepare. We do this through practice, by mastering the required skills we will achieve excellence.
If we honestly can say we did the best we could bringing to bear all of our capabilities for that moment or task then we have success. If we recognize we fell short of a goal and we are willing to sacrafice more time,energy in pursuit of the skills necessary to master the drill then we are learning how to define excellence and achieve it.
By George Chapas on Aug 11, 2009
PS:
I should not talk on the phone and write at the same time. Excuse my spelling on the previous post!!! I promise to proof read future postings.
By David Hinde | Orgtopia on Aug 14, 2009
Hi Jon,
I enjoyed reading this post and it reminded me of an adage a friend of mine uses in her counselling business with her clients. The main reason we compare ourselves with others is to make ourselves feel bad!
I look forward to reading further posts from you. Kind regards
David
By Melissa Favuzza on Aug 19, 2009
This could not have come at a better time….I received a KUDOS e-mail about this wonderful item another employee had made, a beautiful powerpoint for her students. I loved the idea and it motivated me to do something for my students and share it as well. In the end, the feeling I had was that of success. Instead of looking at the other employees recognition with an envious eye, or trying to compare my work with hers, I used her KUDOS to my advantage and became a little more successful in my classroom. So, in turn, by attempting to achieve excellence on my end I found personal success.