Consistency Gets Results
This week my mastermind (peers who sharpen one another) met and we talked about business practices that work. One of the the best practices from my colleague, Chip Lutz – the Unconventional Leader, talked about was the concept of consistency. Consistency in doing little things produces results.
His comment was reinforced by our high school girls’ cross-country coach at awards last night who said the exact same thing about the girls who ran consistently all season seeing improvements in their race times.
This week we’ll look at a few examples and talk about how we can build more consistency into our routines to get more results.
Building More Consistency
Let’s start with an example from most of our personal lives. The dreaded eating of vegetables. Now, I don’t mind vegetables, but they are certainly not my first choice for a snack. I’d much rather grab a granola bar or just about anything that has a load of quick boost carbs in it. However, I know when I consistently choose vegetables as my snack or my side at dinner, my ongoing battle to have a consistent weight becomes easier.
Most of us have a home habit that, with a little consistency in our actions, provides normalization and results. What about at work? What are the little things that make a big difference in our results?
For those of you who are in sales or in work that requires you to woo new clients, consistent calls, lunches and touch points bring you new clients. 10 contacts a week produces 2 new clients. Those two new clients, then tell 10 of their friends, and the results multiply exponentially. However, if you skip a week or two of cultivating relationships, the results also exponentially decrease.
For others of you, the consistent habit may be the weeding out of unnecessary email. If each week, you take a half-hour Friday morning to respond, file and delete email, you find your inbox isn’t overwhelming. Miss a week, however, and your task becomes monumental.
What are some ways to build consistent habits?
- Determine which habits will produce the best results for you. Choose one or two areas where you know, “If I do this more regularly, I’ll get more done. I’ll make more contacts. I’ll feel better about leaving the office for the weekend.”
- Decide what a reasonable habit looks like. You have to know what you will reasonably do. If you decide you’re going to have a zero-message inbox, but you’ve never, once in your life done that, you may want to aim for something more realistic. For me, if my inbox is under 100 messages (all read, but not ready to be filed), I’m in good shape.
- Enlist the help of someone to keep you accountable. Find someone who will check in on your progress and encourage your consistent habit. For most of us, simply knowing someone will ask how we are doing is enough to prompt action, which is what we are aiming for.
You never know where your consistency will lead, but it will lead you somewhere. For some of you, consistency has led to marathons. For others of us, consistency has led to leaving work at work for the weekend. Whatever your goal, it starts with one step, then another.
Go this week and take your first step!
Keynote speaker, trainer, and consultant, Sarah Gibson, helps organizations leverage the power of communication, teamwork and diversity to improve engagement and transform teams. To buy her book or inquire about her speaking programs, please visit www.sarahjgibson.com.
