It is
my belief that the worst thing that can happen to an individual, organization,
or even a society is the average becomes acceptable, or, worse yet, a goal! The
other night while sitting in a restaurant, I was so overcome by the insidious
nature of average that it prompted me to post my feelings about it on my
personal Facebook page! My friends were probably scratching their heads
wondering what has got into Bill this evening!! Luckily my meal was not average
but what got me thinking out loud about this topic to the point I let it
interrupt a perfectly nice evening?
What
got me on this tear was reading an article by Robert McLemee writing for Inside
Higher Ed.com. He was profiling a documentary on Netflix that highlighted the
life and times of self-help guru James Arthur Ray who became infamous after
clients tragically lost their lives in a sweat-lodge experience. McLemee later
went on to point out the hazards of self-improvement quoting psychologist Sven
Brinkman who teaches at the University of Aalborg in Denmark. Brinkman in his
book, Stand Firm, proposes such self-help and improvement efforts are
pointless and that we should “rejoice in our limitations” and that there is
dignity in “acknowledging our limits”. Obviously, this was percolating in me
for almost a week until I could no longer keep it in!
Now I
love my higher education colleagues, but sometimes they we can be a cynical
lot (much like hipsters but without the skinny jeans!). The professorate, often
driven by data, has an overwhelming “prove it to me” mentality and thus, often
dismiss the notion that the self-improvement movement and positive psychology
has done a lot of good for a lot of people. To be fair, those of us in the
industry can be a little “pie in the sky” ourselves. The whole “if you dream it, you can achieve it”
phrase needs to include the second half of the sentence, “but whereas dreams can come true, they don’t come free!!”. We
often forget to let our clients and audiences know they are going to have to earn
the life they want!
So
where am I going with all of this? Essentially, I am saying that if we begin to
accept AVERAGE as the norm and LIMITATIONS as fact, then we are doomed as organizations,
business, and societies. Sadly, though, I believe there are many out there that
desire such a state. A state where merit and achievement is minimized so as to not
make people uncomfortable. Where either everyone gets a prize or no one does! Such
a mentality of mediocrity, however, becomes a prison of the spirit.
As
humans, we are meant to strive, to achieve, to reach beyond ourselves. How else
will we better ourselves and those that we lead? Simply put, the culture
of average limits potential. I think about the U.S. space program as a
prime example. What was once an incredible incubator of new technologies,
materials, methods, and science not to mention a source of courageous role
models for our nation’s youth has now been reduced to our own astronauts having
to hitch rides to the International Space Station on Russian vehicles. The
future and it promises of a better world will NOT be built on average!
So how
do we guard against this culture of average. One thought is to be constantly
asking yourselves and your colleagues some challenging questions like:
- Is our work currently EXCEPTIONAL or just ACCEPTABLE?
- Are we constantly putting forth our BEST EFFORTS or just relying on MINIMAL PERFORMANCE?
- Are we operating as who and what we are NOW as opposed to where we WANT TO BE?
To
wrap this up, I would ask you to look at this week’s blog title. Grammatically,
I am making both a statement but also a REQUEST. Leaders (and you know who you
are!), we need you to save us all from average! As author and speaker Chris
Baez-Brown shares, “autopilot may be efficient, but it is no place to lead
from!”
As always if I can help you and the
people you associate with Get Better, Be Ready and LEAD OUT LOUD, I would
invite you to email me or to visit my website below and see if any of the
training or coaching experiences I offer can provide an impact! Also, as a
bonus, if you go to my Out Loud Strategies website (www.outloudinc.com) and enter your contact information, I will
send you a FREE guide to establishing a mentoring initiative program in your
organization! Such an initiative would be critical to add value to your
organization!
Yours in Leadership (and
still walking both roads!),
Bill Faulkner
Principal Consultant –
Out Loud Strategies
Independent Coach,
Speaker, and Trainer with the John Maxwell Team TM
Email = bill@outloudinc.com
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