One more step

The key to impressing anyone, whether a spouse, friend, employer, customer or other is exceeding their expectations. I believe that people focus wrongly on exceeding expectations by looking at over-delivery only on the final outcome when over-delivery in each incremental step is a lot more important.

In a company I worked in, we once had a secretary at work who booked all our flights. We regarded her as the best in the business only because she took one extra step when booking. She would put the flight details in our electronic calendars. So simple, but so effective that we didn’t need to scroll through hundreds of emails in order to check in online. There are so many opportunities to take interactions to the next level. It is one of the easiest ways to differentiate oneself.

So where does this leave us? Do you try in your interactions to proceed one additional step or simply stick to the task required? Do you look for opportunities to bring the interaction one step closer to its conclusion? For the singles out there, do you ask for a date and suggest a restaurant too? For those that are married with kids do you book the date night and arrange the baby sitter too? For those trying to grow your sales, do you present the proposal and fill in the necessary document for the customer too?

There are just so many ways to demonstrate real value to people every day. It just requires us to go a little further in each interaction. So I am going to take one more step today. In case you are interested in some of the people and resources that have influenced me and my thinking here is a list below:

1. Spiritual growth – I am a Christian Catholic and have been my entire life. I treasure my relationship with God. A lot of my worldview is based on this religious upbringing
2. Leadership thinking – John Maxwell, Doug Conant and Adam Grant are my favourite thought leaders. They are great because they seem to have alternative views that are not mainstream
3. Mindset – In the field of mindset and managing your own mental vitality I recommend Robb Thompson, Dr Dave Martin and Gregory Mckeown. I listen to Dr Dave’s podcasts weekly and they help me a lot
4. Financial well-being – My favourite resource in this regard is The Fat Wallet Show. It is financial education on personal finance in easily digestible formats. The weekly podcast does contain swearing so if this offends you, dont listen to it. The website is professional with no swearing though. Else simply Google financial independence retire early