Going the Extra Mile: How Consistency and Feedback Build Greatness #653

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Definition of Greatness
• 2:45 Chasing Potential to Silence Doubt
• 5:03 Going the Extra Mile
• 8:51 The Power of Consistency
• 11:04 Embracing Feedback for Growth
• 15:03 The Man That Can Scorecard

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:30

Greatness isn't built in a single moment. It's forged in the extra mile that no one sees, in the consistency that compounds over time and in the humility to always ask how can I do better. Welcome back to the man that Can podcast. I'm your host, lachie Stewart. If you're watching on YouTube, you're probably seeing I'm in my bedroom right now. I have had a monster day of travel. I flew down to Melbourne and that is what is going to be today's topic.

Speaker 1: 1:02

I want to talk about being great. It is something that many of us strive to achieve. Greatness, what is my potential? How can I be the best at what I do in a way that allows me to live the life that I want to live? It's a question I always ask myself, and the reason why I went down to Melbourne was for that exact thing to chase my greatness. You see, growing up, I was always missing out on certain things. I would get dropped from the team from injury or, I like to say, politics. But if I accept responsibility, I just wasn't good enough and I just kept thinking if I just had the shot, if I had a chance to prove myself, I know I could do it, because I always worked harder than anyone else in the room. For me, in order as the world gets busier and I think about the life that I want to live, I've just decided that I want to be great, because when I feel great, the negative emotions that come through in my head and pop up on my shoulder that I'm not good enough, that I'm weak, that I'm failure, that I can't be successful they get louder and louder and louder. So, for me, I want to be great. I want to chase my potential. It helps me focus on the things, the positive things, that are going to move me towards that. And when I'm in motion, when I'm working towards things, I feel incredible, I feel worthy, I feel good enough. And it's not always. I still have my bad days, but I would take that over everything. So today I flew down to Melbourne because I have just jumped on board with Saxton Speaking Bureau.

Speaker 1: 2:46

When I finished the run, one thing that I really wanted to commit to doing was being a world-class keynote speaker. Why, for me, I have always wanted to continue inspiring people. 10 years ago, or 2014, I sat in an event listening to a keynote speaker and the words that came out of his mouth I resonated with and it moved me so much. I remember my mom was sitting next to me and I turned to her and I said I'm going to do that one day. I didn't really know what that was that I was committing to, but looking back, I wanted to inspire people to change people's lives, because I was in such a rut at that point in my life. I didn't feel worthy, I didn't really want to live and I didn't know what was next for me. But hearing that he had transformed his life, hearing how he'd done it, inspired me to want more from my life, to believe that someone who didn't know what he wanted, someone who didn't feel worthy, could turn his life around. And here I am, a decade later, still pursuing that, because I don't want to see men taking their life. I don't want to see marriages falling apart, I don't want to see men just wasting their time away. I heard a quote the other day most people die in their 30s and they aren't buried until they're 80. And if you're listening to this, you may feel like that could be you, and I don't want you to be like that. I want you to know that there is still more out there for you. You haven't even scratched the surface of what you're capable of.

Speaker 1: 4:20

I flew down to Melbourne, as I was saying, because I want to be great. My management team most of them, are based in Melbourne. I had a 45-minute meeting to introduce myself to the team, to put a name to the face, so they knew what the story was, what we were going to do together and everything like that Could it very well be done on Google Meets or Zoom. I decided I was going to fly down. Why? Because I want to be great, and I think when you decide that you want to be great, one of the most important things is to go above and beyond, go the extra mile, do things that others aren't prepared to do, to stand out. To many. It's very easy to say, hey, don't worry about that, just do the Zoom. It's just as easy. But I know that they will remember the fact that I flew down from Brisbane.

Speaker 1: 5:10

I took a two and a half hour flight. I then had to catch a train into the city in terrible weather, the freezing, cold day, just to sit with them for 45 minutes. Effort goes a long way. Do not forget that if you want to be great. I sat there and I was talking to everyone. It was so awesome. We were having a laugh, getting to meet, share some stories, find out what their goals were. Some of them were running the Melbourne 10K. I'm going down for the Melbourne Mara hearing where they've come from, what the goal of the company was. And that was just awesome, because I do not believe you get that when you're on Zoom and one of the ladies, not believe you get that when you're on Zoom and one of the ladies she was actually the CEO, lovely lady. She turned to me as I was giving a bit of a brief and she said Lockie, do you feel like you have achieved everything you've wanted to set out to do? Because I told them much of the story I've said here.

Speaker 1: 6:01

Years ago I decided that I wanted to chase my potential, because when I'm chasing my potential which I don't think we ever reach, but I'm just always striving for more I don't have those negative voices creeping in. I don't have the I'm not good enough, you're weak, you're a failure, you don't belong here. All of that doesn't rear its head as much. So I turned to this lady and I said look, a decade ago I made a decision. A decade ago I was deciding that I wanted to be a good father and hell, I was not even thinking about being a dad at this point, but for me, that was just the benchmark as a role model.

Speaker 1: 6:39

For me, learning isn't just about improving my own life. It's about helping other people people like you who are listening to this to be better. The skills that I learned, the environments that I put myself in, the people and the ideas that I get to learn about, I hope to pass on, and maybe one of them resonates with you. Maybe one of these episodes that I do is the one that leaves that aha moment for you. I would love that if that were the case.

Speaker 1: 7:11

So, as I continued to finish it, I said I've set out to do these things. I'm proud of the man that I am. I have an incredible marriage. I've built a career that is flexible and does allow me to be a present dad for when that time comes, but I'm not there yet. I don't think it ever stops because the transformation I've had in my life. I know that there are so many men who are where I once was and my job is never going to be done, because my job, what I believe I'm here to do is to help people who are in the position that I was, to chase their potential to improve their life one step at a time, and so that, to me, was a powerful experience that I maybe wouldn't have gotten asked that question. I would not have gotten to think about that had I not gone the extra mile to get down there.

Speaker 1: 8:01

So, if you're wanting to be great in whatever it is that you do, what does the extra mile look like? What does the thing that so many people are avoiding doing? What is that? What do you need to do? Because, as the quote said at the start, which I just got chachi piti to make based off of a couple of things I wanted to talk about, greatness isn't built in a single moment. It's forged in the extra mile that no one sees. For me, in my marriage, it's bringing the coffee in every morning. No one sees that and it's not really that big a deal and I'm going to keep talking about it, but it's so important in our relationship, it's so important in our marriage because I could be doing anything else. I stop whatever I'm doing as as I'm not in Melbourne, and I make that a priority. So go the extra mile.

Speaker 1: 8:52

The second thing be consistent. One of the ladies said today, lucky actually has speaking goals, almost as if it's like people don't do that. And I turned to her and said, well, anything that I do I wanna be great at, because why would I invest time in something and this is from a career standpoint I'm speaking about, obviously but why would I invest time in something where I'm taking time away from my family, I'm taking time away from my hobbies, if I'm not gonna do it to the best of my ability? And how do I know if I'm going to do it to the best of my ability? You've got to have goals and we're not here to talk about goals today. We're here to talk about being consistent.

Speaker 1: 9:34

But for me, when I decided this is the thing that I want to do, the consistency is in doing the speaking, is in booking the keynotes, is in developing new talks, is in allocating that To get better at the craft of keynote speaking. It's why I love still having the podcast and I'm doing more solo episodes than ever, because I do believe that every time I'm behind the microphone, I'm practicing the skill, I'm flexing the muscle, and it's consistency. It's not about leaving it to the last minute, it is about doing a little bit Every single day To deliver the outcome to greatness. And if I get clear on what being great means as a keynote speaker, it means I need to be able to tell great stories. I need to be able to engage an audience with my voice and how I use my body Okay. And I need to continue to share the story and reach out to audiences and have people not only go wow, that made me think about things, but wow, I felt a shift, just like I felt all those years ago in that event. And that is what I'm committed to doing. Maybe I'm a long way off, I don't know, but I'm committed to doing that and I'm going to do whatever it takes.

Speaker 1: 10:53

And this leads me to my third and final point. The third and final point, ladies and gentlemen, is to always ask for feedback. When I was signing off in the meeting today, I looked around to everyone. I said, hey, thank you, guys and ladies, so much for allowing me to come down today and giving me some of your time. But I want to be honest. I'm new to this speaking thing and if there is anything that you see, I can do and I'm going to send you my talks, but if there is any opportunity to get 1% better, please do not hold back. It may not be always what I want to hear, but it is what I need to hear to get better. But it is what I need to hear to get better. It is what I need to hear to improve.

Speaker 1: 11:39

And so don't take feedback as a personal attack. If people are strong enough and care enough to be able to give you feedback on where you can get better, it is so important in order for you to be great, because greatness has blind spots. I'm going to think about this as I speak out loud. But when we get so focused on doing something, what worked to get us from, let's say, level one to level three may not be the thing or the process or the skill set that will get us from level three to level five, which means we need to grow. But if we don't look outside of ourself and if we don't take feedback on or even review our own efforts to go, hey, I'm not making progress, then that is where it is so important to get feedback.

Speaker 1: 12:28

So, for me, every talk that I give, I send out a feedback form, I hang around and I speak to the room. What did you enjoy? Were there any moments that maybe I lost you? Were there any moments that I could have gone into more detail? How was the energy? How did I use my voice? All of these things are important and so, for your career and whatever you're doing in the areas that you want to be great. What does that look like? What feedback do you need? I even did this, and I still do do this, with my clients.

Speaker 1: 13:06

We do a 360 degree feedback from people in their life from my client's life, so it might be with their spouse, it might be with their children, their friends, even colleagues, to get feedback on how they're showing up in their life. From my client's life, so it might be with their spouse, it might be with their children, their friends, even colleagues, to get feedback on how they're showing up in their life. And it is one of the most powerful tools because, as I mentioned, we all have blind spots, and how we think we're showing up or the results that we think we should be getting may not be actually what's going on. So, to have that feedback, we can then decide whether we want to take it on board and then if we go, yeah, I'm definitely gonna take that on board. We can then work out some action steps in order to move forward.

Speaker 1: 13:43

Very important stuff, but they are my three steps that I thought about today in order to be great. It's why I went the extra mile to fly down to Melbourne. It was a thousand000 investment for a 45-minute meeting. It also took a full day out of my week, which I desperately need at the moment. I feel like I'm under the pump. To me, it was worth it. It was definitely worth it because, in order to be great, you've got to go the extra mile, you've got to be consistent and you've got to ask for feedback.

Speaker 1: 14:15

I'd love to hear from you what does being great look like for you in one of the domains? Now, if we say great across the park, it's very different to if I just say what does being great mean in your career? What does being great mean in your relationship? What does being great mean financially? And if you want to go into more detail or depth or have a bit of an understanding, I created the man that Can Scorecard, which is a 14 question quiz. Right, scorecard? It'll help you see where you're drifting and where you're thriving across the seven domains and give you a little bit of a roadmap, and one thing that maybe many of you don't know is that you'll get some follow-up emails. Those follow-up emails are pretty cool because they're written by me, but the cool thing is I do invite you to take a bigger one If you want more depth and more detail. It's about 30 questions, so I look forward to seeing more of you take it.

Speaker 1: 15:06

I look forward to being able to help you improve your quality of life, because the things that I'm learning from my coaches, the things that I'm learning from my clients, I wanna continue sharing, and I do believe you should go the extra mile. So if you wanna give me some feedback, even on the episodes, on the podcasts, it goes a long way. It means a lot that you take the time out of your day, but it also helps me add more value to this show, because if one of these episodes or one of my talks can change people's lives the way that I was impacted when I listened to that keynote all those years ago, then I'll be so happy. I'm signing off. My name is Lachlan Stewart. Thank you, guys for tuning in.