I noticed the new school sign. It still had the same insignia of the Chi Ro Christogram but now it also had the words Strength, Service and Success.
As we crossed the old bridge over the River Irwell, that umbilical cord of the Industrial Revolution, the dogs strained on their leashes as two cyclists approached from the other side.
I looked up at my old school, St Gabriel’s RC High School, Bury and a wave of nostalgia welled up. My wife and I remembered the teachers, what would they be doing now? It was over 36 years since I had left, would they all still be with us? Times of course have changed, the school grounds are all fenced off now, there were safety railings on the steps.
The Order
My first thought when I saw the sign was, yes Strength, Service and Success are admirable values to have, but what do they mean really? Why were these values named? This train of thought continued as we walked. Then it struck me. The values Strength, Service and Success are in a particular order for a reason, the first being strength and lastly success.
Everything must start with your strength. Service is how we employ our strength and success is the end product.
Strength
What do we mean when we talk about strength? The first thing that comes to mind is physical strength.
Physical strength.
Athletes, and sports people who are in competition with other athletes, for example, will work on their strength as well as their as their technical ability. If they are stronger, than their competitors, they will have an advantage. If two athletes have the same technical ability, the stronger will win.
We can obviously increase our physical strength with exercise, in which we will stress our muscles. The recovery from this stress will involve an increase in muscle mass, as the body adapts to be able to cope with increased workload.
The converse will be true as well. A lack of physical exercise doesn’t mean that your strength will remain static. Your strength will be reduced by prolonged inactivity. I have run marathon races in the past, but I know that I would need about four months to re-train for another marathon, as my endurance will have decreased since the last one.
Mental strength
We are not all athletes, though. How would physical strength help with the academic? Wouldn’t they need mental strength, meaning the ability to concentrate on a given concept for extended periods of time? Natural intelligence will obviously help the academic, although this would be for nought if they were unable to concentrate for the period of time required to finish the work.
Just like a physical muscle, the ability to concentrate can be exercised.
Emotional Strength
Emotional strength is now recognised as a prerequisite for business strength, often called emotional intelligence.
Sales is one of the primary skills in business. Even if you are not in a sales position, you will benefit from selling your ideas to colleagues. Inspiring your team is also a form of selling. The effective salesperson has emotional strength, as they can control their emotions. Are people born with high emotional strength? No obviously not. Show me a toddler with high emotional intelligence.
Mood
Emotional strength will express itself as someone’s mood. A person could be having a difficult day and feeling down however they can still check their mood. Its great advice to get in the right frame of mind before undertaking something important. The expression ‘leaving your troubles at the door’ holds good.
One way that sales is great for developing your emotional strength is by exposing you to rejection. The more successful the salesperson, the more rejection they have faced. It’s a simple numbers game. If two salespeople have the same conversion rate, let’s say 10%, but salesperson A makes 50 calls whilst salesperson B makes 100, then A will make 5 sales to B’s 10. However, salesperson B will have twice the number of rejections (90) than A.
Over a career, salesperson B will develop their emotional strength deeper.
Read my post describing my sales prospecting process, where I show you how you can overcome a fear of rejection.
Financial Strength
Money doesn’t buy you happiness, however it can help solve problems. If something breaks down in your home, like a boiler, having an emergency fund ready can turn a disaster into just an annoyance. Having insurance policies in place gives us piece of mind and saving up in a pension gives us the knowledge that one day we will not need to work to support ourselves. We will be able to mature with dignity.
Having a pot of capital can often help a new business to scale quickly to the point where it is self-sufficient. I have saved up capital for down payments on investment properties. These in turn have given me financial independence. I am not reliant on the state to support me.
So financial strength is something to strive for, it is a good thing to do.
Altruism
Having money gives you the chance to be altruistic. Are there any causes that are close to your heart that you could donate to? Having financial strength means you can do this without harming your own finances. What is it the flight attendant says before every flight? ‘Put your own mask on first before helping others.’
Spiritual Strength
The final strength is spiritual strength. My old school moto is The Lord Gives Me Strength. In our postmodern era, when many religions are on the wane, there is a void where once there was God. We are hardwired to have this belief in something bigger than the self. If we are not careful it can be filled, without our choosing. We can fall for scams, cults and gurus. We worship at the feet of celebrities and sports-heroes, not realising that there are normal people just like us, with all the same flaws.
Before I stopped digesting the news altogether, I became struck be the religious zeal that followers of political parties would display. Anyone from the ‘other side’ or someone who questioned ‘The Science’ is a heretic.
So, what is the answer? I’m not suggesting we revert back to organised Religion, although that may be preferable. What I am saying is we should believe in something bigger than ourselves, but we should choose it consciously and carefully. This will give us the spiritual strength to protect us for the frauds and fake gurus. If we have a North Star to guide us it will give us the strength to speak up when we see something blatantly wrong.
Exercising each is the key
In all the examples of the different types of strength, the one common denominator is that you can increase the strength by exercising. Physical exercise is obvious, but we can also increase our mental strength through practising concentration. We can make this easier by removing things that decrease our mental strength, such as scrolling on phones and trying to multitask.
Emotional strength can be increased by exposing ourselves to things that could dampen our mood. Cold call sales are a fantastic way to do this, as we expose ourselves to rejection. If you aren’t in sales, you can practise this by speaking up in meetings and putting your ideas forward.
If a position becomes available which is more senior, put yourself forward. Be unattached to the outcome, as you may be rejected. Count the rejections as a badge of honour. You are one more ‘no’ closer to a ‘yes.’
Saving money gives you financial strength. Its a great feeling to know that you have capital built up to weather any financial emergency. Eventually your capital will grow with compounding until you no longer need to work again.
What about spiritual strength? Find something you believe in that is bigger than you. It could be getting involved in a community, a charity or your wider family. Spiritual strength will anchor you. Without it, you are at the mercy of the currents of life, of scams and fake news.
Service
So, strength gives you a platform from which to serve. Let’s have a look at how you can serve.
Employer
I was told many years ago to always do more than you are paid for. Serve your employer, go the extra mile. Do it out of habit and do not expect extra reward. It’s a law of the universe that rewards will come eventually, through promotions pay rises or being head hunted. This law of the universe can’t fail to work. Take pride in your work, treat it as your craft. You are a craftsman, creating a masterpiece.
Colleagues
Help your colleagues and be a team player. As you do, you will be seen as the go-to person. You will be indispensable to your organisation. Don’t hog information. If you know something valuable, share it. As you pass your knowledge to your peers, you increase your own expertise and your capacity to learn more grows.
Customers
Businesses in the private sector must service their customers or risk going bankrupt. All things being equal if the price and quality of the product is the same then the business who provides the best service will win and retain more customers.
In my earlier sales career, most of my time was spent on Account Management, for good reason. It was a competitive industry (Specialist Hygiene Systems to the Food Industry). In the time I had available for new business development, when I visited prospective new customers, the biggest complaint I heard was that the incumbent supplier gave poor service. Poor service can mean a lot of things, from late deliveries, to just not being listened to. If you are in business, it is your job to listen to the customer and serve them.
Audience
In the entertainment and sports industry, people pay good money to attend performances. They want value for money. Some of the best concerts I’ve been to are when the band give absolutely everything. Even though they are playing dozens of concerts around the world, this show feels like the only one they will ever do. Because of that these bands have the most loyal followers. They are serving their audience well.
I would contrast this to a forgettable gig I once went to where the band were sullen and there was no chemistry between the band members. It was at the end of a long tour and was supposed to be the homecoming concert. Their hearts weren’t in it, there was obviously something amiss. The band split up shortly after the end of the tour. As a post-script they have just announced they are reforming after 14 years and will be performing a new tour. I won’t be going.
Success
We’ve explored how strength gives you the ability to serve and we’ve touched on how success comes from serving. Let’s explore success a bit deeper.
The myth of the overnight success
When we look at successful people especially those in the limelight, such as films stars, they often seem to gain overnight success. They suddenly burst on the scene and gain critical acclaim. The next thing you see them everywhere. It’s as if they have won the metaphorical success lottery. But this is a myth.
What we are seeing is the result of years and often decades of working and honing their craft. In the lean years they take what work they can. This includes smaller roles to keep a roof over their head (service), but also to practise, practise, practise. They will have had hundreds and thousands of rejections and failed auditions but they keep on going. (Mental Strength).
What we also don’t see are the thousands of individuals who gave up on their dreams of success.
The law of compounding
The law of compounding is a very real law in finance, I’m sure you’ve heard of. Compounding also works in the development of skills. Over years and years of adding small improvements, reviewing your progress and iterating, you will see very little visual progress at first. If you keep stacking these improvements, however, eventually there will come a point when there seems to be a massive leap in competence.
As an example, let’s say there is a certain actor with an arbitrary skill level of 1, on their very first day out of acting school. They decide to improve their skills just 1% per week. Obviously this is hypothetical. What number would their skill level be after one year? The answer would be nearly 1.7. If you improved something by 1% per week you would be 1.7 times better in a year. Good but not enough to make a dent.
What about 2 years of 1% growth per week? The answer? You would be 2.8 times better. After 3 years you would be nearly five times better. Impressive, but again, you may feel it isn’t great progress. You may be tempted to quit as you feel you aren’t getting anywhere. What about after 10,20 and 40 years? Making small 1% improvements per week?
- 10 years = 177 times better.
- 20 years = 31,205 times better.
- 40 years = a staggering 973,772,415 times better.
That’s the law of compounding ladies and gentlemen. My guess is that our hypothetical actor who hones his craft would ‘burst onto the scene’ somewhere between 10 and 20 years of consistent practise and small weekly improvements.
Promotions
So, we make consistent and small incremental improvements, or to put it another way we increase our strength and improve our service offering, and suddenly we burst on the scene. Or so it seems from the outside. What about in the world of business? If we diligently apply ourselves to the tasks and always go further than we are required, we improve as a person, but what about success?
This is where grasping opportunities plays a role. So, an opening comes up in your company for a promotion. It’s obvious that you will have more chance of landing this elevated role compared to your colleague who has gone through the motions and is at the same skill level as the day they started. What if no opportunities arise in your company? Then the marketplace and other employers will take note of your performance. You will eventually be head-hunted into an improved position.
Winning the trophy
I am reminded that Olympic Athletics must be a tough business to be in. You dedicate your life to your sport, improving everyday and yet you still may not be successful in terms of winning the gold medal. Your chance of gold occurs every four years and you are competing with the best in the world. There can only be one winner.
I’m sure your situation isn’t like that. Success may not be winning the trophy or the Oscar. For me success means achieving small incremental goals and improving every day.
Luck
In success, luck plays a part. You might be at the right time and place and the opportunity floats on up to you, but you grasp it and you never look back. For me though luck is something you can influence. What does the saying go? Luck occurs when opportunity meets practice. Or the golfer Gary Player said it better ‘the more I practice the luckier I get’.
Practise your craft, so you increase your strength, to give better service and watch out for lady luck along the way.
The virtuous circle
Success to me isn’t an event, it’s a process. Let’s say you achieve what you set out to achieve, for example your business has reached a certain level of profits. Then that would give you more financial power. Success therefore gives you strength and so it starts again. It’s a virtuous cycle.