By learning to consistently do things well, regardless of how much we enjoy the specific thing we’re working on, we set ourselves up for success.
Consistently doing things well doesn’t mean being successful at everything you do. It means that you’ll execute the task at hand to the best of your abilities. Even when no one is looking. Even when there’s no external reward.
Establishing and maintaining your own personal gold standard of execution defines your character. Regardless of the task at hand, your gold standard of execution is the baseline level at which you operate.
It may sound simple, but this ability to disconnect the quality of effort delivered to a task from how interesting or fulfilling it takes discipline. It’s a rewarding daily practice that requires constant effort.
Define Your Gold Standard
A good example of this mindset at work is the way you clean your house.
Cleaning your house doesn’t require any special skill or experience. Doing it well is a matter of choice, patience and attention to detail. Do you touch only the areas that are easily visible? Do you literally sweep things under the rug or do you take time to vacuum behind the couch?
When you practice the skills that will help reach your objectives, are you intentionally working on the aspects of your craft that need it, or are you just showing up and phoning it in?
Deliberate practice isn’t reserved for athletes and artists. The way you do things today defines how you will do things tomorrow.
By training yourself to perform small, routine tasks at your gold standard of execution, you create a habit of doing things well that will carry over to bigger, more complex tasks. It strengthens the “do things well” muscle.
Whether the outcome of a project is successful or not depends on many factors that are outside of your control. Writing a perfect novel doesn’t automatically mean it will be a best-seller, just like cooking a ribeye steak to perfection won’t impress the vegan guest at your dinner party.
When we give our best effort to the task that’s in front of us, we tap into an internal source of satisfaction. There is a sense of pride and calm that comes with doing things well. Focusing on the aspects of the job that are within our control removes the anxiety that comes from anticipating someone else’s opinion to validate our work.
The reward is the satisfaction of a job well done. External validation doesn’t hold the same weight in our minds when we know that we’ve given it our best shot.
Consistently Good Is Better Than Occasionally Great
Loyalty to a brand, service or person is all based on one thing: a proven track record of meeting or exceeding expectations.
When choosing a place to eat for your next date, are you going to choose the restaurant that has 25 five-star reviews and 20 three-star reviews or would you rather go somewhere that has 400 four-star reviews? It’s the same average rating but they tell a different story about what you can expect as a guest.
Whatever your job or field of interest, there will be gatekeepers between you and where you want to be.
If you’re working at a traditional job, your boss and their own boss need to approve that promotion you’ve been working towards. If you’re exploring more artistic or entrepreneurial ventures, you will inevitably need people on your side to make your dream a reality.
Consistently performing to our gold standard lets the gatekeepers in our lives know what to expect when they get behind us. Our proven track record speaks for itself. They can rest assured that you will deliver on the promises you make.
More importantly, proving to yourself that you can consistently execute at your gold standard gives you confidence in your own skill and work ethic.
When you show up on game day to perform or the financing for your business comes through. You know that you can tackle whatever comes next. You’ve been consistently good every step of the way so far. Why would the next step be any different?
Training For The Big Time
When we become disengaged from the routine tasks that need doing on the way to the goals we want to achieve, we not only make it less likely that we’ll ever achieve them. We make it less likely that we’ll be able to do well once we get there.
Let’s take a young professional working in a big corporation as an example.
She finished her degree two years ago and has been working at her current job since. The company’s values align with her own and she believes in the vision. She feels that she’s ready to move on from her entry-level position to the next level. She wants to be a project manager and make a bigger contribution to the company.
Since day 1, her boss has noticed her ability to produce high-quality work efficiently and he supports her in her ambition. In the past few months, however, she’s become disengaged. The promotion is slow coming and her motivation has dwindled.
She’s not doing the simple tasks that she’s already mastered as well as she did when she first got hired. She started off as a top performer but is now leaning towards average. Her confidence has gone down and so has her boss’s trust.
On paper, she has the experience and track record of good work that’s required to get the promotion but her most recent performance makes her doubt that she’s really cut out to be a project manager. Her boss feels the same. What if she gets the promotion and quickly becomes bored with it and starts to drop the ball?
We are only as good as the last thing we’ve done. By maintaining our gold standard of effort in everything we do, we’re practicing for the big opportunities that we seek and showing ourselves and the world that we’re ready for the big time.
It’s easy to get lost in our dreams and believe that once we’ve “made it” the grind will cease and things will get easier. In reality, the opposite is more likely. The reward of getting the exciting opportunities that we seek is the opportunity to do the work. There is no coasting.
All the time spent doing the small things well prepares you for whatever comes next because it is by definition disconnected from “what” you do and is entirely focused on developing “how” you operate.
Done Is Better Than Perfect
It’s important to differentiate the commitment to giving your best effort from being a perfectionist.
Being a perfectionist is counterproductive. It slams the door to creativity shut.
Accepting nothing less than perfect output stifles the trial and error process that is key to learning and improving. Expecting to do everything perfectly the first time around is a ball and chain that nobody needs to drag around.
Worst, being a perfectionist creates an excuse to not take chances or try anything new. The unrealistic expectation of leaping over the gap from beginner to master without making mistakes makes trying new things look pointless.
Being focused on operating to our gold standard and leading with our best effort makes things happen.
It means that we won’t rely on excuses when we fail because excuses don’t contribute to improvement.
It means learning from your mistakes and making sure that they won’t be repeated.
It’s a state of constant learning and evolution.
Chasing perfection is like hunting unicorns, you’ll work really hard for a long time chasing something that doesn’t exist.
Writing this today serves as a self-reminder that I need to focus on executing what is in front of me to my own gold standard. Too often, I get caught up in the dream of what comes next and neglect to give my best effort today. I forget that the way I do small things today set the stage for the big things of tomorrow.
To close this musing on doing each of the things that are right in front of us well, I leave you with a quote from a man wiser than I could ever hope to be.
“The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what is in Fortune’s control and abandoning what lies in yours.”
-Seneca