During the peak of my marathon running days, there were plenty of times I’d be facing a 20-mile training run on a humid Sunday morning. My legs were still heavy from my Friday speed workout, plus I often had a slight hangover and some annoying minor injuries.
Sweating out the next 2-1/2 hours alone with your thoughts can make even Navy SEALs want to throw the covers over their heads. But I’d tell myself: “Just get through the first 20 minutes and then call it a day if you’re not feeling a little better. At least it will speed up the hangover recovery.” Most of the time I’d make it to the 20-minute mark, trying not to look at all the happy people heading out to Sunday brunch, the beach or the air-conditioned mall, and convince myself to grind out another 20 minutes. At the 40-minute mark, I’d do another gut check. Get to the 60-minute mark and then reassess. “I might not make it the full 20 miles today, but at least I’ve got a respectable number to put down in my training log.” And then another 20 minutes would be behind me, and then the mindset shift to: “I’m more than halfway to today’s goal. Might as well keep going for another 20.” Rinse, repeat, spit.
I bring this up because the 4th Quarter is underway, and we’re starting to hear more and more excuses from clients for not getting their weekly writing assignments done. Whether it’s your turn to do the firm’s weekly blog, or byline an article for a trade journal or finish the next chapter of your book, we’re seeing more and more zeroes in our weekly progress meetings.
I get it, this is the time of year when client obligations seem to increase, just as time gets compressed due to year-end deadlines, family obligations, travel delays and volatile weather.
You vs. You
“In the battle of life, your toughest opponent will always be yourself. It’s YOU vs YOU every single day,” explained motivational speaker, David Goggins. To win, you have to callous your mind, push past pain, and do the things you don’t feel like doing.” See Goggins’ No Excuses Mentality
Goggins’ approach might be too hardcore for some of you, but situations like these shouldn’t be tolerated at any professional services firm. For three weeks, one of our clients told us he didn’t have time to review our edits to his 800-word blog post – something that didn’t require more than five minutes of his time. Another client took almost a month to clarify two sentences (30 words) in the lead paragraph of her column for a widely read national trade journal. She missed the deadline and a very high visibility opportunity for her firm and personal brand. Another client took over two weeks to get his headshot and an up-to-date bio to the producer of a Top 100 podcast and missed the interview opportunity.
Ouch!
Are you busy or a perfectionist?
I get it. We’re all super-busy putting out fires and dealing with client emergencies. But if you don’t carve out a little time to work ON your business rather than always in it, you will never move yourself forward in the thought leadership ecosystem.
When it comes to writing, we’re here to do most of the mental heavy lifting for you. We just need a few minutes of your undivided attention to tap into your expertise. Otherwise, the end product won’t sound like you or ring true with your audience.
When preparing for your weekly Gut Check™ calls with us, just tell your assistant to hold your calls, turn off your mobile phone and set aside 20 minutes to focus exclusively on your next assignment for us. When 20 minutes is up, you might not have reached the end zone, but at least you moved the ball down the field and picked up a couple of first downs. You can build on that momentum for the following week.
Isn’t that a lot better than telling yourself: “I don’t have time for Berkowitz this week,” or “I’ll never get this done, so why bother?”
To paraphrase Winston Churchill, “Don’t let perfection be the enemy of progress.” Many of you are detail-oriented professionals. When you say you don’t have time to write/edit/review, you’re telling us you don’t have time to make it absolutely 100% perfect. We don’t need perfect, and neither does your audience. They just need authoritatively good and more importantly, they need to hear from you on a consistent basis.
As my college track coach used to bark at us: “Anyone can run fast when they’re feeling good; we’re going to teach you how to run fast when you feel like crap and your ass is falling off.”
Conclusion
You may not set a personal best every day, but by making consistent, incremental progress, you’re becoming the best professional you can be. That’s called the “Kaizen Effect,” named after the Japanese word for continuous improvement.
What are you and your colleagues doing to make incremental progress every day? I’d love to hear from you.
#goalsetting, #practicemanagement, #contentdevelopment, #thoughtleadership, #DavidGoggins
