Run Your Business: Put the work in

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One of the things I love about running is that nothing comes easy. You have to earn everything.

You have to earn every step you make. You want to run long distances? You must train and gradually build distance. You want to run faster? It’s the same thing; you have to work really hard to push your body out of its comfort zone.

It’s funny. So many non-runners think this is easy. If you can already run a 5K, how hard can it be to run a 10K? They have no idea how hard you must work to reach new plateaus. Many also have no idea how many weeks or months they must train, even if they are only running a short distance. Somehow, everyone expects instant success regardless of how little they put into it.

In nearly every race I’ve run, I’ve seen so many runners dropping out throughout the course.

Nearly every one of them admitted they didn’t train properly. They assumed a couple of good training runs were enough to get them across the finish line.

The olympic track star, Olympian Usain Bolt has a great quote on this: “I trained four years to run nine seconds, and people give up when they don’t see results in two months.”

If you want to succeed, you have to work for it, and you certainly cannot expect instant results. It’s not just with running. I’ve seen the same attitudes and expectations with our workforce.

Recently, a new technician reached out and asked to speak with me. We sat down and he expressed his desires to grow into sales and our management team. I love this attitude and let him know how excited I was to hear this. Not only does it show passion and drive, but it is amazing to see a young person looking into the future and seeing a long-term career with our company.

Or so I thought.

I really thought he was talking about his long-term goals. What he was really saying was that right now he was ready to move into sales and our management team. At this point, he had been with our company for two weeks. Two weeks!

I asked him, with all seriousness, what made him feel he was ready to move into sales and management. While I appreciate his confidence, his answer was absolutely shocking.

He said that he had nothing new to learn. In his time working with us (Again…two weeks!), he was able to service every one of our different groups of customers. In just two weeks, he serviced everything from individual apartments, single-family homes, apartment buildings and hotels. He was very proud that since none of them complained, he obviously knew everything he needed to know on how to service them and was ready to move up the ladder.

Not too surprisingly, that technician is no longer with us. He was not willing to take the time to learn his craft and gradually rise up through the ranks. Worse, he was convinced that he really did know it all. Like so many runners, he thought one good training run was all he needed to finish the race. Shortly after that conversation, he left us, seeing different opportunities.

I’ve always felt you had to work for everything you wanted. Put in the hard work, then you can reap the rewards. It is something so simple, yet something I find so rewarding. If it was easy, I always felt, everyone would do it.

Set your goals. It may be running that big race or attaining a new position. Put the work in. Work on it every day, and you will get there!

Have a great run!

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from Pest Management Professional https://www.mypmp.net/2024/02/22/run-your-business-put-the-work-in/
Sacramento CA