part three is over here
a few years ago i asked my students to attend a talk given by a special guest visiting our school. the man speaking was an alum of the university and now the ceo of a large investment firm. he stressed, emphatically, the importance of excellence and making sure that all of your work and all of your interactions were thoughtful and nothing short of outstanding. in the class i teach, excellence in your work served as a cornerstone, if not the entire point, of our lessons and we were deep enough into the semester that my students knew being excellent and thoughtful took time, like a lot of time (e.g. to make a good, passable twenty minute presentation can take four to five hours, but to make a great, memorable presentation you're looking at more like like fifteen to thirty hours, depending on how soon the inspiration comes). to this principle one of my students asked the man, "i understand the importance of being excellent but can you speak to how one is to find the time and energy to be excellent all of the time?"
to say i wasn't proud and impressed by my student's cogent question would be a full-on lie, especially next to the other ridiculous questions being wasted on this guy. unfortunately the man's answer kinda just stuck to the rallying cry of there is no rest for the successful and they are always working and they are always excellent which was a mainstay of his overall talk.
the next day in class we discussed the talk. someone commented that they felt his answer to the girl's question was lacking. i agreed but then defended him saying that it's hard to have a bulk of questions fired at you, moments after completing a talk, and get all of them perfect (which unfortunately soils his be excellent all of the time argument). i told them given his experience and how thoughtful his talk was if he were given a few minutes to properly ponder the question he might have said something like:
being excellent does take time and energy and there are not enough hours in the day or cycles in our minds to make everything we touch be excellent, but the true mark between the successful and those relegated to basements and back offices is successful people know when it is important to be excellent. because not all tasks and moments are equal and thus not all tasks and moments should or can receive equal attention.
fact is, i wouldn't have been surprised to see this man clap his knee while in his first class seat home as he thought of a better answer to the young, eager girl's question. he might have even mumbled audibly as he realized the missed opportunity to have been excellent.
part five
