CONCLUSION
Get Busy Now
Now that you are equipped with new knowledge on how to improve your career prospects, what are you going to do with it? What changes are you going to make? The key to any learning exercise is to put that knowledge to work efficiently. If you wait a few days, those days end up turning into weeks. As each week passes, you are further removed from the content and remembering less and less of it.
High achievers put their newfound knowledge into practice as soon as possible. That is why if you want to maximize the benefit from the knowledge and practices you have obtained from this book, you will need to chart out your plan of attack to implement it immediately.
As you start to practice and polish your skills, do not expect an overnight change. Improvement takes time. Stay persistent and focused on your objectives. Your career and the evolution of your skills are a marathon. Steady and consistent progress will yield the greatest returns. Inevitably you will face many bumps in the road and obstacles on your journey.
Mistakes and miscues have been a very important part of my personal and professional growth. My short professional baseball career is a great example of this. I molded myself into a pitcher with little high school experience and essentially no college playing time. (I briefly walked on as a senior.) Every night after a ten-to-twelve-hour day at my office job, I would work on my pitching development plan. I did not miss an opportunity to pursue my dream. It did not matter if there was snow on the ground, I would get my workout in. I would run through simulated bullpen sessions by throwing against an elementary school brick wall (with a strike zone painted on it), because I could not find someone foolish enough to catch my bullpen sessions during the cold nights of a Chicago winter. I worked out constantly, read everything I could on pitching, and took pitching lessons from an instructor who typically worked with young kids. The goal was simple: to get a little bit better each day. I did that over a period of several years.
As I progressed, I went to every open tryout I could and was cut from every team (including independent leagues). Those failures did not deter me. I kept working and looking for that next opportunity to display my skills. With a ton of hard work and some good fortune, I secured a workout with the New York Mets. My preparation finally paid off as I dazzled them in my workout and was signed the next day. My transition from the business world to professional baseball was a rapid one. I was in an office on a Friday and in spring training on Monday.
My time in professional baseball was marked by several key mistakes. I assumed that the organization would have a plan for my development, just as they would with all players. Because of my lack of experience, I thought I was different, and that they would nurture me accordingly. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I struggled, trying to find a direction for the development of my skills and my baseball career.
Another mistake I made was that I became focused on mechanics during my first season. Obsessed may be a better way to put it. This singular focus compromised my development in the following ways:
These things, coupled with a few health challenges (hip and shoulder issues), made my professional career a rather short one. I am often asked if I miss playing or wish I was still playing. And the answer is yes, of course. But despite the challenges, I look back at my time very fondly. I was given a gift: a chance to play professional baseball, even though it appeared to be a long shot at best when I started the pursuit of my dream. I put my best effort forth and learned critical lessons about organizations and myself that have helped propel every aspect of my personal and professional life since.
My rapid ascent through the business ranks can in many ways be attributed to my baseball miscues. Since then, I have never assumed that any person or organization, other than myself, is responsible for my development. I personally own that. I made sure that the first skill I built up was my confidence, and that I embodied and projected self-belief. It has served me well. An early mentor (and now a friend) of mine summed it up quite well: “Lukas, you have accomplished and tackled many business challenges that, at the time, you were not even remotely qualified to take on.”
I take that as a huge compliment. It means that my preparation and self-belief helped to propel me through challenges that I lacked experience with. Thank you, baseball, and my previous failures.
That’s the funny thing about failing. Most of us are taught at an early age to be afraid to fail. We don’t want to look foolish. While I am not advocating to purposely try to fail, just don’t be afraid of it. That fear will cripple your growth. Mistakes and miscues can help you:
Once you embrace the power that can be derived from failing, you become truly powerful. You welcome the formation of a growth mind-set. A growth mind-set is one that approaches every situation, challenge, and project as an opportunity to improve. An example of this mind-set is athletes in action sports, because you can clearly see the physical manifestation of the power of persistence. Do you think that motor-sports star Travis Pastrana goes out there and on his first attempt at a new trick, like a double backflip on a motorcycle, lands it clean? Think again. There are plenty of failures and injuries behind the scenes. Do a search online for “Travis Pastrana injuries,” and they will blow your mind.
His list of injuries is a scary experience to look at, and I don’t understand how he is still functioning at the level he is. I digress. Every time he attempts and fails he learns something (and probably hurts himself ). But he is not deterred. It makes him successful, that ability to power through every fall and failure, and push the limits of his capabilities. The power of perseverance, the ability to dust yourself off and continue to attack without deterrence, is incredible.
Ordinary people accomplish enormous goals by demonstrating grit and commitment in the face of repeated failures. If you stick to your purpose through difficult times, often you will be able to tap into the deepest parts of your potential.
The most common pitfall that trips up individuals is to look at every situation, challenge, or test in terms of passing or failing. That mind-set simply labels oneself a winner or a loser. The flaw in this approach is that it prematurely stunts the development journey by allowing the individual to ignore valuable feedback from the activity. The next time a person with the pass/fail mind-set is confronted with a similar situation, they are less likely to improve. Those who approach every test, activity, or project with a growth mind-set will continuously benefit and prosper, while those who see it as pass or fail will never learn or move forward.
Guess what—you will make many mistakes in your career as you develop your skills. It can be the best way to learn. When you make a mistake, it sticks with you. Like a child who touches a hot stove—he only has to do that once to learn from his mistake. So it is in careers: Good workers learn from their mistakes and grow. But the great ones pull from an even bigger pool of learning opportunities—and learn from the mistakes of others.
Don’t be deterred by the challenges that confront you in your career. There is a remarkable amount of talent buried inside you. To fully realize it, you must be dedicated and persistent enough to dig deep and unearth it.