Use It Or Lose It

Posted on by Scott

superhero-2503808_640One of my favorite movies of all time is The Incredibles. It’s the story of a family of superheroes who are forced to live ordinary lives and suppress their abilities. The world has grown weary of heroes and the main character, Mr. Incredible, struggles to adjust to a life defined by mind-numbing routine. He longs for something more. He dreams about a world in which he can make use of his unique gifts.

And the frustration he feels is palpable.

But when they time comes for him to don his superhero outfit and spring into action, Mr. Incredible finds that his powers aren’t quite what they used to be. Years of inactivity have diminished his ability. He has lost much of his strength and isn’t sure he has what it takes to win the day.

Sadly, I feel many of us are like Mr. Incredible. Each of us has been blessed with specific talents and interests, but we let them lie dormant. We deny ourselves the joy of fulfilling our true purpose and others the benefits of our gifts. Everyone loses because we try to be something we’re not. Something less.

Talent is perishable. Skills that aren’t used diminish. The inner drive you feel to achieve greatness will fade if you don’t tap into it.

I’ve heard that houses left empty degrade faster than houses that are lived in. Ships that stay in port too long collect barnacles more quickly than those on the open ocean. Even our own muscles will atrophy if we don’t exercise them regularly enough.

The truth is that houses were meant to be lived in. Ships were meant to sail, and we are meant to move. Our calling is not to ignore our talents, but to maximize them – to share them. We were designed to do great things, each of us in our own way. Why do so many of us hold back? Why do we shy away from greatness?

Is it because we are afraid? Is it because we feel a need to fit in? Is it because someone else doesn’t appreciate the gifts we bring to the table? Are saving our best for something else?

How dare we!

I know people who wouldn’t waste a dollar, but they throw away talents that are infinitely more valuable. They let opportunity after opportunity to do something great pass them by. And every time I see them, they look miserable. Just like Mr. Incredible.

Fortunately though, his abilities haven’t completely disappeared. As he begins to exercise his muscles, his body falls more and more comfortably into moving the way it was supposed to all along. And as they follow his example, each member of the Incredible family discovers their own unique gift. They combine their very different talents together in pursuit of a common goal, and emerge victorious.

What’s your superpower? What incredible ability do you bring to the table? What’s keeping you from realizing your full potential?

Take a look at your team’s goal. Identify how you are uniquely positioned to add value, and remove the barriers keeping you from success. Be the hero. Save the day. Use your gift. Otherwise, you’ll lose it.

I dare you to be incredible.

Measure Twice, Cut Once

Posted on by Scott

metro-1179249_640Growing up, I was fortunate to live next door to my maternal grandparents. As you can imagine, they were a significant influence on my life. Both of my parents worked, and I didn’t have cable TV or video games or cell phones. If I wasn’t out getting into trouble with my friends, I was at my grandparents’ house – often helping them in the garden or snapping peas on the porch.

My grandfather took up woodworking after he retired. My favorite days were when I’d exit the school bus and see the door to his workshop open. I knew that meant he was building something and I could earn some money sweeping up the sawdust he made. As we worked in the shop together, my grandad would share tips and tricks he’d learned while mastering his hobby.

One tidbit that has stuck with me through the years is this:

“Measure twice, cut once.”

You see, once you cut a board, you can’t fix a mistake. You might be able to glue a piece back on, but it won’t be the same. The grain won’t line up, the cutline will be obvious, and the whole piece will be just a little short of what it should have been. In other words, you can’t out things back the way they were. It’s better to check your measurement and make sure your marks are right before you cut. That bit of wisdom has saved me more times than I can count in my own workshop.

But even if you’re not a woodworker, I believe it stills makes sense to measure twice and cut once.

How many times have you said something that you instantly regret? How many times have you clicked Send on email only to immediately wish you hadn’t? How many times have you acted in haste and found yourself wishing you could turn back the clock?

Once the words are spoken, you can’t take them back. Once the email is sent, someone will read it. Once you act, there are unavoidable consequences.

I can’t tell you how many times I wish I’d measured twice and cut once. I’ve spent hours, even days, trying to repair damage I’ve done to relationships as a result of a hasty decision. But no matter how hard I try, the impact of my poor decisions is impossible to erase. I may have smoothed things over. I may have managed to get past the initial dustup, but the mistake is always there.

Fortunately, I’ve also saved myself on many occasions by listening to my grandfather’s advice. There have been so many interactions that could have gone badly had I not paused and thought about what I was about to say. I’ve written hundreds of emails that were deleted rather than sent simply because I thought twice about the implications of my actions.

There will always be times when you have to act quickly. There won’t always be a chance to measure twice. But those are the exception rather than the rule, aren’t they? And I’ve found that the act of pausing to think twice when I have the opportunity to helps me make better initial decisions when time becomes a significant factor.

I don’t know if my grandad knew he was feeding me life lessons as he shared his workshop wisdom. Maybe he was just reminding himself not to repeat a costly mistake. But I’m thankful for the impact his life has had on mine. And when my children join me in my workshop, I often share the lessons I’ve learned. It’s my hope that they will find value in my words as they build for the future.

What words of wisdom guide your path?

What’s Your Plan? (Part 4)

Posted on by Scott

district-1264717_640So far this month, we’ve looked at the importance of having a strategic plan, steps for developing a strategic plan, and some tips for ensuring execution. I want to close out this series of articles by focusing on idea of plan review.

Even the best plans need periodic review to make sure they are still relevant. Any number of things can lead to a necessary course adjustment. Market fluctuations, competitive positioning, regulatory restrictions, personnel changes, and policy or procedure adjustments – all could mean your well-defined plan just went out the window. On top of that, it’s a good idea to periodically check the numbers and take the pulse of the team.

Approximately every 90 days, I suggest pulling the team back together for a strategic plan review. This is your opportunity to kick the tires and make any tweaks needed to keep the plan moving forward. Here are a few questions you can ask as part of your review:

  • Did we get what we expected from each particular strategy?
  • How far off the mark are we?
  • How far over the goal did we get?
  • What worked, and why?
  • Can we do more of those activities that seem to be bearing fruit?
  • What could have been done to make it even more effective?
  • What fell short, and why?
  • Can we fix it, or was this just a bad idea to begin with?
  • What should we have anticipated that we didn’t?
  • What are our team’s strengths?
  • How can we capitalize on these in stronger ways?
  • What internal issues need to be addressed so we can be more effective going forward?
  • What outside forces need to be dealt with?
  • How needs to happen to improve our FOCUS?
  • How needs to happen to improve our MOTIVATION?
  • How needs to happen to improve our ACCOUNTABILITY?

These and other questions can help stimulate a discussion about the state of the team’s performance against the plan. Based on the insights gleaned from your discussion, you should update your plan. Plug the holes in viable strategies.  Reinforce the efforts put into the best ones. Replace the worst ideas with new ones that seem promising.

These periodic reviews are a great way to reenergize the team. You’ll find people recommitting themselves to the process and approaching their work with a renewed energy. Ownership will go up and the dedication they show to the plan will bleed over into other aspects of the job.

So, the strategic planning cycle looks like this:

DEVLOP > EXECUTE > REVIEW > REPEAT

The bottom line is to treat your strategic plan less like a one-time event and more like a living, breathing part of your team. Like any employee, your plan needs support, attention, and ongoing development. The more you put into the strategic planning process, the more you will get out of it.

What’s Your Plan? (Part 3)

Posted on by Scott

implement-2372179_640Developing a strategic plan is a significant accomplishment. Most teams never get to the point of creating a step-by-step road map for success. Those that do improve their chances of achieving their goals exponentially.

But plans are meant to be executed. All of your team’s efforts in creating a great strategic plan are wasted if nothing ever gets done. Sadly, a great number of plans are simply filed away and forgotten. To avoid this from happening to you, you need to address three aspects of plan execution.

  1. FOCUS. I think it was Mike Tyson who said “no plan survives a punch in the face.” Every plan encounters opposition. There will be barriers. There will be setbacks. There will organizational changes that no one anticipated. How do you keep competing priorities from interfering with execution of the plan? How do we overcome the tendency to lose sight of the plan (any plan) in order to address the inevitable fires that pop up?

Things you can do:

* Set clear boundaries. Block out dedicated time on the calendar for working on the steps of your strategic plan. Keep other things from encroaching on your work by making them taboo during the allotted time.

* Communicate. Don’t just assume everyone is focused on the plan. Review progress during your team meetings. Ask for updates and encourage discussion around best practices.

* Create habits. Ramp up the focus to level 11 for a short period of time to help establish new habits critical to the success of your plan. You can back off once performance becomes routine.

  1. MOTIVATION. Even the most excited supporters of a project will start to lose momentum after a while. Yet motivation is a key part of a successful strategic plan? Plus, it’s linked strongly to things like profitability, customer satisfaction, and employee retention. How do you keep the team energized? How do you ensure each individual gives their part of the plan their best and doesn’t default to just going through the motions?

Things you can do:

* Give up control. People are motivated by autonomy, so where possible, allow them to choose how they complete their part of the plan.

* Give them the tools. Ask team members what resources they need to perform at their best, then work hard to see they get them. Nothing motivates like knowing your leader is behind you.

* Give them some competition. A little friendly contest might be just what the team needs to stay motivated. Spice things up by introducing periodic short-term incentives based on the activities in your plan.

  1. ACCOUNTABILITY? Yuck. This is probably the most hated word in all of management. Few leaders embrace this aspect of their role. However, top performers actually thrive in an environment of strong accountability. When everyone is expected to play by the same rules, the team is freed up to focus on succeeding. So how do you keep the team – the entire team – do what they are supposed to be doing?

Things you can do:

* Set clear expectations. Let the team know, in no uncertain terms, what acceptable performance looks like. Speak to the behaviors you want to see, not just the results.

* Praise the good. When you witness someone engaging in behavior that moves things in the right direction, let them know about it. People will give you more of what you praise them for.

* Address the bad. When you witness someone engaging in behavior that moves things in the wrong direction, let them know about it. Don’t assume it will stop. Letting things slide is tantamount to praising it.

As the leader, your job is not to just develop a strategic plan, it’s to see that it gets executed as well. Execution is actually the most important part of the plan. A poor plan executed well is worth more than a brilliant plan executed poorly. Make sure to keep your team focused, motivated, and accountable.

What’s Your Plan? (Part 2)

Posted on by Scott

They say that the first step to success is having clearly defined goals. They should be written down and reviewed regularly. In fact, many experts speak to studies that show individuals who take the time to articulate their goals in writing have a much higher likelihood of actually achieving them.

If goals are the first step toward success, I believe having a strategy is definitely the second. A goal without a plan is just a dream. And like your goals, your strategic plan should be as clearly defined as possible. It should be written down and referred to on a regular basis.

Last week I promised to walk through the steps to creating a basic strategic plan. If you’ll follow this outline, you should wind up with a roadmap for achieving the goals that have been set out for your team. That’s what a well-written plan does. It not only points you in the right direction, but spells out the steps required to arrive at the desired destination.

There are five steps to developing your strategic plan.

1. DEFINE. Start by defining your goals as narrowly as possible. Perhaps your goal is to grow sales by 5% over the next year. Well, 5% of what, exactly? What specific products do you need to focus on? What group of customers or prospects? What are the interim goals you need to achieve so that a 5% growth becomes possible? What are the deadlines involved?

By defining the goal as much as possible, you start to break the journey down into more manageable pieces. When staring at a forest, it can be difficult to determine which tree you should cut down first. The more you define the expectations in front of you, the more you start to focus in on specific solutions

2. DESIGN. Having identified, as specifically as possible, what it is you are after, the second step is to create a rough outline of your action plan. Pull the team together and brainstorm activities that will help you achieve each goal. This process involves the entire team. Anyone involved in executing the plan ought to be part of developing it.

When brainstorming, remember that the goal of the exercise is to come up with as many ideas as possible. In order to achieve this, you must create an environment conducive to sharing ideas. Make sure the team understands the rules of brainstorming:
* No negativity. We don’t judge the ideas presented by others.

* Limit distractions. Try to eliminate outside influences that will interfere with the team’s ability to focus on the exercise.

* Crazy ideas are ok. Some ideas might be laughable, but they are still valuable as conduits to other lines of thinking.

* Keep moving. Don’t dig too deep into any the specifics of any one idea. The goal of brainstorming is volume. Talking through any one idea at length will bring the flow of ideas to a halt.

* Start individually. Have team members walk into the meeting having already written down a few ideas of their own. This will help jump start the process.


3. REFINE. Now that you have a list of potential strategies, it’s time to start trimming it down and refining the best ones. Settle on the best ideas and then start tightening each one up by asking a series of questions.

What does that look like? What will we get? What would this strategy to fail? Keep asking questions until you have a plan of action that can’t be refined any further.

4. ALIGN. Determine what resources you need in order to execute your plan. Are there people outside the team you need to bring in? Are there marketing resources you need to create? Are there budget or approval hurdles that need to be cleared? Make sure you have all the necessary pieces aligned to help ensure your team’s success.

5. ASSIGN. The final step in developing your strategic plan is to assign responsibility for each bit. Determine who has ownership of each step and verify understanding of expectations. Don’t walk away from a great strategic plan without addressing this part.

Now that you have a plan, it may feel like the work is done, but it’s just beginning. The plan is meaningless without action. Next week, we’ll take a look at some tips for implementing your strategic plan.

What’s Your Plan?

Posted on by Scott

We really are creatures of habit, aren’t we?

We humans have become extremely proficient at developing routines. We find comfort in the expected, so much so that we rely on it. We become dependent on it. Our expectations start to revolve around systematic events over which we have no control. We fall into a rut and set ourselves up for disaster.

Because, what happens when the routine breaks down? What happens when that email we’ve come to expect every Monday morning doesn’t arrive on time? How do we respond when the friend or coworker that’s been so reliable suddenly isn’t there for us anymore? What are we to do when the customer we were counting on to make our monthly numbers takes their business elsewhere?

I don’t mind a good surprise now and then, but there are some things I like to have control over. When it comes to running (and growing) my business, I don’t want to be so dependent on things outside of my control that a surprise break in the routine can cause chaos. That’s where a good strategic plan comes in.

I’ve said before that “hope is not a strategy.” However, that’s exactly how many leaders run their business. They sit back and hope enough new business will walk through the door to make their numbers. Others rely on assumptions. They assume the same customers will always come through. They assume market conditions will remain favorable. Things have always worked out in the past, so they just assume things always will.

Hope and assumptions are not sound business strategies. Having a plan is. A strategic plan outlines the results you want and the steps you and your team must take in order to achieve those results. There is no hope or assumption involved. There is action – specific, measurable action that, when executed properly, virtually guarantees your success.

A lot of leaders will say they have a strategic plan in place. Few actually do. Oh, some may have a few ideas written down on a piece of paper somewhere – typically because they’ve been forced to by someone up the food chain; but I rarely meet teams who have proper strategic plan.

A simple strategic plan includes three components.

1. Goals. What is it the team is trying to achieve?

2. Actions. What has to happen in order for the goal to be achieved?

3. Accountabilities. Who is responsible for executing the identified actions?

Over the next couple of weeks, I’m going to walk through the process of putting together a strategic plan. I’ll give you some tips for writing your first plan, or for plugging some holes that might exist in an existing one. You can follow along and have a basic strategic plan for the rest of the year completed by the end of August.

It’s not too late to take control of your year. It’s not too late to break away from the routines that might be holding you back. Now is the time to stop hoping, stop assuming, and lead your team across the finish line in championship fashion.

Now is the time to make success a habit.

The Three Types of Service Providers

Posted on by Scott

service-1660848_640Over the past two weeks, I’ve been involved in two very different service opportunities. The first was a week-long Boy Scout summer camp. This involved 6 long, hot days full of manual labor and mentoring of young men in an outdoor setting.

The second was a one-night charity catfish fry to benefit a local food bank. Here, volunteers came together to host an event lasting only a couple of hours. In this case, there was a shorter, intense spurt of activity.

While these two service opportunities were very different in nature, I couldn’t help but notice that they were staffed by the same three types of people.

1. The “Look at me!” service provider. These are the people with ulterior motives attached to their volunteerism. They make a big show of participating, but in hindsight, don’t appear to have contributed very much. They disappear when the hard work needs to be done, but are all too eager to accept the flashy, spotlight-centric assignments. When all is said and done, they brag about how much they contributed to the success of the effort.

2. The “Why me?” service provider. These are the reluctant volunteers. They show up either to escape other responsibilities or because it would look bad if they didn’t. They aren’t really vested in the outcome, yet manage to find plenty to complain about. Even after the time to serve has past, they’ll continue to gripe about the imposition that was caused or find fault in the performance of others.

3. The “It’s up to me.” service provider. These are the committed few. They believe in the purpose behind the cause and willingly shoulder the lion’s share of responsibility. Their motivation is the betterment of those on the receiving end of their service. They take care of things because they see a need and have the skills to meet it. They do so without expectation of fanfare or even recognition.

I’d like to say that I always fall into the third category. But I’d be lying.

Serving is, by definition, a giving of oneself. To serve others, you have to put them first and yourself second. That just doesn’t come naturally to most people. It doesn’t come naturally to me. So, sadly, I can look back on occasions when I’ve served in order to bring attention to myself. I can identify times when I have been a reluctant servant. And I am ashamed.

People like Colonel John Paul Stapp, Bapurao Tajne, and fighter pilots Marc Sasseville and Heather Penney remind me what it means to serve. These people didn’t look for glory or act out of a sense of obligation. They saw an opportunity and said “It’s up to me.” And they inspire through their acts of selfless service.

What if more people said that? What if I said it more often? Imagine the impact a single individual can have on the life of another simply by deciding to act.

Internal Service Month may not be a recognized holiday, but then it really shouldn’t be. I shouldn’t need some official call to focus on serving each other. I should just do it.

Because it’s up to me.

Flying to the Front

Posted on by Scott

sunrise-86008_640The two pilots worked quickly, but quietly, each lost in their own thoughts. Colonel Marc Sasseville and Lieutenant Heather Penney stepped into their flight suits and moved systematically through their pre-flight preparations. It was Sasseville who finally broke the silence.

“I’m going to go for the cockpit,” he said.

“I’ll take the tail,” was Penney’s reply.

It was late morning on September 11, 2001 and this was no ordinary mission for the two fighter pilots. Hijackers had flown two airliners into New York’s World Trade Center and one had just hit the Pentagon. Word had come down that a fourth plane was headed for Washington. Sasseville and Penney had orders to take it down.

The pilots had just completed two weeks of air combat training, and the drills were fresh on their minds. However the planes they flew were still loaded with practice ammunition. In fact, there were no armed aircraft available at all. Prior to 9/11, there was no system in place for responding to a localized attack. Everything was geared for a timely response to missiles coming from overseas. It would take an hour to get a jet ready, but by then it would be too late.

So, as Sasseville and Penney took to the air, the only weapons they had at their disposal were the very planes they were flying. “We wouldn’t be shooting it down,” Penney recalled. “We’d be ramming the aircraft. I would essentially be a kamikaze pilot.”

It’s hard to imagine being put in this type of situation. Most of us will never face a scenario where we are forced to put our life on the line to serve others. But the actions of Sasseville and Penney provide some important insights into the minds of top service providers.

The best take personal responsibility. There were a lot of pilots who could have gone up that day. As a Colonel, Sasseville could have ordered someone else to take the mission. It would have been very easy, even logical, for him to stay on the ground and coordinate things. Penney was still a rookie, the first female F-16 pilot in her squadron. In addition, her father was a pilot for United Airlines at the time. He could very well have been on the plane in question. It would have made sense for a more seasoned, more objective airman to go. Yet, despite having good reasons for staying put, the Sasseville and Penney felt called to act.

The best take action immediately. Sasseville and Penney didn’t wait for their planes to be armed. They didn’t sit through the pre-flight checks that normally take half an hour to complete. They were in the air within minutes. Penney’s crew chief had to run alongside her jet, pulling diagnostic wires from the fuselage as she taxied away. Time was of the essence, so waiting was not an option.

The best take care of others first. As Penney herself acknowledged, these pilots were embarking on a suicide mission. Personal survival, much less comfort, was not a primary consideration. As they searched the skies over Washington for the hijacked plane, the two ran through multiple scenarios, trying to figure out the best way to ensure a completed mission. They considered ejecting just prior to impact, but the thought of possibly missing and allowing the hijackers to reach another target was simply not acceptable. They had to protect the people on the ground.

Sasseville and Penney didn’t have to sacrifice themselves to stop the terrorists aboard United flight 93. The passengers did. It wasn’t their job, but they saw it as their duty. They took action, and they protected those on the ground.

When it comes to serving others, are you all in, or do you hold back? Do you commit completely, or is your service contingent on your own comfort?
To deliver exceptional service, you don’t have to be trained for a particular opportunity.

It doesn’t require that you carry the weight of an assigned job responsibility, or that you even know the people you are serving. Service is an attitude.

Take responsibility. Take action. Take care of others. Serve.

The View From the Well

Posted on by Scott

fountain-2311804_1920For forty days, his friends laughed at him. For forty days, his neighbors insulted him. For forty days, his family begged him to stop embarrassing them. Yet, for forty days, Bapurao Tajne continued to dig.

Tajne lives in Kalambeshwar, a village in the Maharashtra region of India. After years of drought, the residents of this rocky corner of the world were growing desperate for water. Some villages had begun rationing their dwindling supply, and people often had to travel for miles to find a well that hadn’t gone dry.

After making one of these long treks to a working well, Tajne’s wife found herself denied access to the water her family so urgently needed. She was a Dalit, the lowest members of India’s caste system. Dalit’s were poor, uneducated, and generally despised by the higher castes. The well she had come to for water was owned by an upper caste member who insulted her and sent her away empty-handed.

Upon hearing his wife’s tale, Tajne cried. He was used to the daily struggles of life. Dalits earned their living via manual labor, often working long days for low wages. He was used to the insults his people received on a regular basis. But hearing of his wife’s shame broke him.

And then it spurred him to action. Vowing never to beg for water again, Tajne gathered what money he had and walked to the nearest town. He bought a few tools, prayed for guidance, and started digging.

It typically takes four or five men to dig a well. It’s backbreaking work and the going is slow. As the hole gets deeper, the extra hands really come in handy for moving the loose dirt and rock. But Tajne dig alone. He started early in the morning, putting in four hours of work before heading off to his day job. After returning home, already exhausted, he dug for another two.

No one came to help him. Other villagers called him a fool. There was no water, they said. The drought had rendered other wells useless, so his effort was being wasted. He’d give up soon enough.

His wife, the very catalyst for his action, pleaded with him to stop. It was bad enough being a Dalit. Why bring even more shame on the family and their community? Just accept things the way they are and move on.

Tajne ignored all the negative feedback coming his way and focused on the task at hand. Day after day, hour after hour, he chipped away at the hard, unforgiving ground. Finally, forty days after he’d first begun, he struck water.

Suddenly the attitudes around him changed. Friends gushed with words of support. His wife apologized for ever doubting him. Family members picked up shovels of their own and offered to dig alongside him. Tajne’s response shocked the world.

He had no harsh words for his critics, and no reprimand for his family. Instead of berating the doubters and turning them away, he offered them a drink from the well. He had, after all, dug it for them.

How often do we withhold service because we aren’t receiving the response we feel we deserve? How often do we wrap our acts of selflessness with expectations of self-promotion? It’s as if we’ve forgotten what service truly is. Thankfully, we have men like Bapurao Tajne to remind us.

Taking One For the Team

Posted on by Scott

match-1100912_1920His hands fumbled for the release on his seatbelt harness. Tugging at the catch set him free and he began to slowly pull himself out of his seat and to his feet. Dazed and somewhat confused, he reached out his hands toward the voices racing toward him. They were concerned voices, but excited. The phrase “fastest man on earth” reached his ears. He strained to see the men who now surrounded him, their hands supporting him and patting his back, but he could not see them. He was blind.

It was December 10, 1954, and Colonel John Paul Stapp had just reached a top speed of 632 miles an hour, faster than a .45-caliber bullet, strapped to a rocket powered sled. He’d accelerated from zero to max velocity in 5 seconds. But his ride wasn’t meant to see how fast man could travel, or fast he could accelerate. This was a test to see how fast a man could decelerate, and live to talk about it.

At 632 miles per hour, Stapp hit the brakes and came to a dead stop 1.4 seconds later. His body absorbed forces 40 times that of gravity. His eyeballs shot forward in his skull, leaving him with two black eyes and blindness that fortunately only lasted a few hours. But Stapp had expected something like this to happen. It was, after all, his 29th trip on the sled.

Col. Stapp was a doctor with the United States Air Force, and an example (granted, an extreme one) of the sacrifices many take in order to support their coworkers. Stapp and his team conducted extensive research into the results of deceleration on the human body. Their work resulted in design changes to military aircraft and safety harnesses that have allowed pilots to literally walk away from catastrophic plane crashes. His findings have also influenced the automobile industry, leading to safer occupant restraint systems around the globe.

Service always involves some degree of sacrifice. That’s because service is more than just a job. It’s an attitude. Your job description might require that you perform certain actions in order to satisfy a customer’s needs, but the manner in which you approach your work determines whether it’s remains a job, or gets elevated to the position of service. As we celebrate Internal Service Month, I think it’s only fitting that we explore the sacrificial characteristic of service.

Colonel Stapp’s approach to his job illustrates three key aspects of sacrificial service.

1. He expected to sacrifice for those he served. Stapp knew his body would undergo an incredible amount of stress in pursuit of his research. He even anticipated that he might emerge from the speed sled having lost his sight. In the days leading up to the run, he practiced dressing and undressing himself in the dark so that he wouldn’t be totally helpless afterward. But Stapp knew that his sacrifice could save the life of the pilots he served. Service is suffering so others don’t have to.

2. He accepted that his sacrifice would be ongoing. One of the reasons Stapp knew to expect blindness was because he had experienced it before. His record-setting run wasn’t his first; it was his 29th. Previous rides down the track had left him with a laundry list of injuries. He’d suffered concussions, broken ribs, hernias, hemorrhages, and shattered bones. But Stapp wasn’t in this for the quick victory. He knew that service was the only way to ensure the desired outcome. Service is an attitude, not an act.

3. He volunteered for the sacrifice. Studying rapid deceleration was Stapp’s job. He’d been assigned to lead this particular branch of research. But he didn’t approach his work as something he’d been forced to do. After more than 30 test runs using dummies, Stapp determined that only live human testing could provide the data needed to protect live human pilots. The word went out for volunteers, and several showed up. But Stapp wouldn’t ask others to do what he unwilling to experience himself, so he was the first and most frequent test subject. After his record-breaking run, Stapp’s superiors had to forcibly ground him out of concerns for his long-term health. Service is a calling, not a job.

Do you know someone who has willingly gone out of their way to help you out? Which coworkers have given of themselves again and again so that your job could be made a little easier, or a little safer? Who approaches their work as a calling, rather than an occupation? Don’t you think that sacrifice is worth acknowledging?