Be Unreplaceable by Taking Care of Little Things
I saw newly scattered garbage on my driveway in front of my car. My empty garbage container was off to the right of the ground trash. To the left of the trash, the garbage collector gazed at his mistake and mess. Turning abruptly, he was off to the back of the truck, where he athletically jumped aboard and was gone.
I was amazed that he had taken no action to pick up the trash on my driveway. Why would he knowingly not take care of the problem?
On other days, the garbage collector pulled the garbage container to the truck and efficiently transferred garbage from the container to the garbage truck. On the day of the garbage mess, he hurriedly grabbed bags from within the container. Then he sprinted to the truck. Unfortunately, he ripped one of the bags as he pulled it out of the container, and the garbage fell to the ground.
What would an unreplaceable person do in a similar situation?
To be an unreplaceable person, you need to monitor yourself. You might even use the strategy of pretending someone is watching you. That someone might be a person that you respect highly.
Had I been standing on the porch, would the garbage collector have made a different decision? He might have picked up the garbage, knowing that I was watching.
Customers, employers, mentors, parents, coaches, and others are only sometimes watching our actions. We need to monitor ourselves.
Let us consider two possible answers to why the garbage collector left the garbage on the ground:
Maybe he was a new employee.
Possibly he was an employee who did not care about his job.
Not caring is much different than not being aware of expectations.
If he were a new employee, perhaps he did not understand his responsibilities, which would include cleaning up a mess caused during the transition of garbage. His trainer may not have communicated the importance of garbage transition.
It appeared that he considered speed to be important. Did someone teach him that speed was more important than quality? He was moving extremely fast. Is speed an essential component in his evaluation?
Speed and quality do not always go hand-in-hand. When I moved into my current house, I noticed that painters had recently painted the walls. Overall, while walking through rooms quickly, the paint job quality appeared good. However, upon closer inspection, I would describe the job as low quality. The best house painters only put paint where it belongs. In my house, the painters slopped paint on door hinges - not just a little paint. Little effort was made not to smear paint on the hinges. I was not there, but I bet they were painting as fast as possible.
While inspecting the house, I did not notice the sloppy paint job. I moved too fast during the inspection. The next time I inspect a home, I will slow down and be more observant.
If I called the garbage or paint companies, they would assure me that quality was a part of their service. The company's owners would share that employees should not leave garbage on the ground, and paint should not be covering door hardware.
If it was not training or the results of a new job, why did the garbage collector not take action that would seem reasonable - pick up the garbage off the ground? He may not be aware of how each of us has an opportunity to become unreplaceable.
He may not be interested in completing a quality job. He was not taking care of the little things that add up to be big things. Customer satisfaction is a big thing for a company, and the highest quality employees contribute to positive customer satisfaction.
Unreplaceable people are lifelong learners. They look for opportunities to improve. They understand what quality looks like because they study others and processes that bring about exceptional results.
I have never heard an unreplaceable person make the following comments:
They need to pay me more to do a quality job.
I do not care about my job.
Someone else will take care of the problem.
They will never notice this poor job.
People who do not care have an important lesson to learn in life. They are setting themselves up to fail. Proactive people will outperform people with bad outlooks. Bad-outlook people will be overlooked in promotions and not be ready for opportunities. Employers will not give them more responsibility.
People that care about their personal results set themselves up for life opportunities.
People that are unreplaceable understand that their obsession with quality and getting results will eventually lead to opportunities. They take care of the little things. Other people notice their dependability and see the drive to improve. For this reason, they are the ones that gain more responsibilities, which leads to more significant successes.
Emily Dickinson, the great American poet, said, "If you take care of the small things, the big things take care of themselves." Would she have considered not picking up trash dropped on the ground as a little thing?
Always take care of the little things. You should learn expectations and deliver results above those expectations. Self-monitor your attitude and actions to produce quality results repeatedly. Pretend that someone you respect is watching you. Ask, "Would they be proud of my effort?" People notice unreplaceable people because unreplaceable people stand out from the crowd.
Questions:
Identify a role in your life (e.g., student or employee). What choices can you make now to make yourself unreplaceable?
What is your opinion about unreplaceable people?
Elaborate on reasons to become unreplaceable.
If you were employed and did not like your job, why would it be better to have an unreplaceable attitude?
Change the following comments to comments from an unreplaceable person:
They need to pay me more to do a quality job.
I do not care about my job.
Someone else will take care of the problem.
They will never notice this poor job.
Martial Arts Perspective:
At Delaware Hapkido Martial Arts Academy, in addition to learning martial arts skills, students help each other in the learning environment. Although we do not go to martial arts competitive events, we have a family and team environment. We want all students to be unreplaceable through their actions with team members. Students find the unreplaceable mindset works in and out of our training facility. We want our students to be unreplaceable in life.
The image in this post is an image from Glorify, Inc. We have a Glorify license agreement to use images and design tools from the Glorify site.
