Friend, former Navy SeAL, and all-around great guy, Clint Bruce, tells a story of when his SeAL Team just returned from an excellent operation. Clint wanted to do something nice for the guys to reward them for their excellent work, so he looked to his Chief for advice on how to reward them. His Chief responds, “The reward for excellence is no punishment.” (4:09-5:11)
My first visit to the Naval Academy was for a program called Summer Seminar, a week long program that gave high school students a sample of what Plebe Year and the Naval Academy had to offer. I thought I was pretty smart, until I started talking to some of the other participants. As an ice-breaker, some kids went into the brainy version of “how much can you bench, Bro?!” asking each other’s GPA.
I remember the first person to state their GPA said 4.3. “Wait, what?! Is that on a 5 point scale?” Unfortunately, this was my first introduction to high school AP courses and what they do to your grades (almost as embarrassing as my first question in nuclear power school, years later). GPA above 4.0, that’s an elite class. My grades were another story, but I thought they were excellent. Katt Williams said people buy Chrysler 300’s because they look like a Bentley…until a Bentley pulls up. I thought my grades were excellent…until I find out people have GPA’s above 4.0. We don’t always know there’s more we can be doing, but once we find out and accept that we can do more, we must strive to do more. Luckily I was able to reap some of the same rewards as those elite students, but I wouldn’t bet my future on getting that lucky again.
Excellence will make you think you’ve made it. It will make you think you can rest. When others tell you to take a break, keep going. In business, there’s someone else with a relentless desire to succeed, not relying on yesterday’s success. They won’t rest, so neither can you. Even in your personal life, you may think you’re being the best partner you can be, but I guarantee you, there’s something else you can do to make your relationship better. Do it!
Once you get a taste of the true rewards that come from going beyond excellence, in the pursuit of elite, you’ll see what you were getting was simply “no punishment.”
I implore you to pursue elite and reap the rewards.
Disclaimers:
If this sounds like a humble-brag, maybe it is. I used to do good enough, then wanted excellence. It wasn’t until I pursued elite that my life changed immeasurably for the better, both personally and professionally. It’s not up to me to judge whether I’m elite, but I’m certainly pursuing it.
This is not an ad, although Clint does give great speeches. He has a business to help people Pursue Elite (www.pursuingelite.com).
What was your first question at NPS?
Ha, I had to know that was coming. I must have been lost in the notes I was taking to miss the introduction to this concept, but I looked at the board and saw what looked like pencils in a cup. The instructor had just said we were about to see an example of what a reactor core looks like. I asked, “well wait a minute, when I see a nuclear reactor on the Simpsons, I see big rods above some glowing fluid, and what you have there looks nothing like that. Am I missing something?”
Sure did. Missed him say that the pencils in a cup were a representation of a core to illustrate the idea. Welp, that was the key part that I missed, but apparently no one else ever thought the Simpsons accurately portrayed what a reactor core looked like, as determined by their laughter.