Today’s post is from Crystal Hammon, a great writer and blogger and keen observer of life. In her post, Crystal shares four high-performance habits which have enabled her husband to build a successful business.
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I’ll soon be married for 23 years. In that time, I’ve learned a few things about success just by watching my husband, who is very good at what he does for a living. Only part of his success is due to God-given talent. The rest stems from very deliberate attention and day-in, day-out practice. All day. Every day. For decades.
I suppose you could have that much experience at something and still not be good at it—but not if you gave it the kind of focus he has. Having a ringside seat to his high-performance habits has planted some ideas about what it takes to climb to the very top of your field and also how to lead a better life.
Here are four observations I’ve made while watching my husband Jim grow a business:
Be single minded. Once he decided to start his own business, my husband never looked to the left, right or backward. He observed others in the same business, but he never tried to copy them or make direct comparisons. Preparation. Knowledge. Confidence. Thoroughness. Well-reasoned strategies. These weren’t just his start up tools; they are the stuff he uses daily after 15 years of running his own business. It’s a disciplined mindset that isn’t thrown by events, rumors or perceptions.
Repeat, repeat, repeat. Whatever we do over and over again, we’ll master. This means we must be very choosey about what we repeat. If you constantly nag your spouse, you’ll become a nag. If you throw your clothes on the floor day after day, you’ll be a magnificent slob. If people are always taking advantage of you, you’ll be a lifelong victim. Want to become good at praying, swimming, selling, sewing, teaching, painting or writing? Do it every day. Market conditions have changed dramatically over the past 15 years, but Jim keeps practicing and refining the value-added sales rituals that have helped him grow and maintain business.
Get help. If you have a rotten golf swing and you go out and practice it every day, guess what? Your swing will remain terrible. When what you’re doing isn’t getting the result you want, you must figure out what you’re doing wrong. That often involves finding and studying with someone who knows a lot more than you do or possibly hiring people to fill in the gaps between your strengths and weaknesses. Rather than working on things he can easily hire others to do, Jim wisely preserves his time for high-value activities that generate revenue.
Avoid avoidance. When I review my early career, I can now see that being a renaissance girl was only part of the reason I was willing to leap from one occupation to another and then back again. The rest was a pattern of refusal to work through frustrating or tough spots. Every occupation has them. Jim has never been reluctant to do the dirty work of plowing through messy, complicated choices. That’s helped him push through one setback after another and on to higher planes.
I wouldn’t trade the experiences I’ve had working in different fields for anything. But I will always wonder what may have happened if I had simply knuckled down earlier in life and worked my way through various obstacles rather than trading them for others. Real learning and mastery comes only after things get difficult. You can put it off, but sooner or later, you must push through these barriers if you want to achieve excellence.
These principles apply to marriage, hobbies, work, spiritual development and every other part of life I can imagine. To get the goodies, you must be single-minded, repeatedly practice your work, ask for help and be self-disciplined.
I’d love to be a scratch golfer, an accomplished seamstress and a well-read bibliophile, but since I’ve decided to dabble in all three areas, I’ll always be just that—a dabbler. In my professional life, though, I’ve put a stake in the ground and committed myself to the ups and downs of being a writer and editor for as long as there’s a viable market for my services.
Who do you know that models high-performance habits? What have you learned from them?
Crystal Hammon is director at Leading Reads, a marketing firm that helps businesses develop original content to support their brands. She is also a registered yoga instructor, golf fanatic and editor of Dressed Her Days Vintage, a blog devoted to Then & Now stories about everything from fashion to culture.
