A few years ago, I was guest motivational speaker to a group of bank executives at their zonal retreat. The focus of the retreat was to attempt to galvanize their performance in such a way as would empower them to make the input necessary to outperform their peers.
The bank in question had recently raised scores of billions of naira from the capital market and consequently had its shareholding base enlarged, thus necessitating improved profit and profitability on the enlarged capital base to ensure good returns to its equally enlarged shareholders. Besides, all other stakeholders of the bank would naturally expect more value from a much-enlarged bank and this boiled down to better performance expectations from the people in charge of the day-to-day running of the bank in terms of its bottom line vis-à-vis those of its competitors.
I chose the above topic – Exceed the Expected – for my delivery that fateful day. This was because I believed that if each individual staff of the bank chose and acted in such a way as to exceed the stakeholders’ expectations, then the bank indeed would collectively exceed its stakeholders’ expectations. It was a big task no doubt, but nevertheless one that was achievable.
Our fate in our hands
We each have our fate – the level of our very own successful achievement – in our hands, whether in our personal lives or our work life. As Sidney Newton Bremer put it, we are each about 50 per cent responsible for anything that may happen to us, for our fate indeed lies nowhere else but in our very hands and we must steer it as we choose.
This reminds me of the account of a certain man who found himself in the position of the captain of a vessel, even though he was inexperienced in such tasks. The story has it that as soon as the ship sailed out, the captain watched in amazement many of the things going on in the vessel. He particularly watched as a certain young man steered a big wheel now here and then there, and he finally asked what the wheel was for. He was told it was the steering of the ship, which determined in which direction the ship would go.
The captain, however, ordered that the sail should simply be put up and that the steering man should quit the exercise and find something ‘more useful’ to do on the ship, arguing that the ship needed no steering until an obstacle appeared in sight. And so the steering man reluctantly quit his position, after trying to convince the captain otherwise to no avail.
Well, the story goes that only a few survivors lived to tell the story of the foolish, inexperienced captain after the vessel crashed and sank, killing the captain and most of the sailors on board.
The morale here is simply that our fate is in our hands, and we should not for once leave the steering to the wills of life’s uncertain winds, chance or happenstance.
It is not beyond you!
Nothing is beyond mortal man. Let me repeat again that statement for emphasis: Nothing is beyond you even as a mortal.
The Bible, God’s own Word, declares profoundly that ‘Ye are gods.’ We are indeed gods and there is about nothing we put our minds to that we cannot attain. Most of the things in existence now through man’s invention were thought impossible just a few decades ago. And by extension, many of the things that man will bring about in a few decades from now would beat our very own imagination. All of these will come through the instrumentality of individuals, of mortal men.
And you can’t be too young!
A man cannot be too young to attain his heart’s desires, as history is replete with examples of great achievements attained at unprecedented ages.
Alexander ascended the throne at 20 and conquered the known world before 33. Julius Caesar captured 800 cities, conquered 300 nations and defeated 3 million men, became a great orator and one of the greatest statesmen known while still a young man. Washington was appointed Adjutant-General at 19, was ambassador to France at 21, and won his first battle at 22. Elizabeth Barrette Browning was proficient in Greek and Latin at 12. Hannibal, the greatest of military commanders, was only 30 when he conquered Rome, and nearer home, our own General Gowon was barely 29 when he became Commander-in-Chief of the Federation.
So, go ahead and….exceed the expected!
You can now buy copies of my book, INSPIRED KEYS TO SUCCESSFUL ACHIEVEMENT on Amazon. Please find below the purchase links for the book:
PAPERBACK: https://www.amazon.com/dp/9789423578
KINDLE: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BSXQDYHY
