“I can’t believe it! Just a couple of tweaks to my resume and marketing materials and, all of a sudden, I am getting dozens of interviews. The phone hasn’t stopped ringing!”
As Gretchen’s coach, I shared in her excitement and joy. But I wasn’t at all surprised. Gretchen’s got the goods: she’s bright, energetic, articulate, and personable. And she’d been doing the work: stepping up, asking the right questions, listening deeply, and taking action.
Making small changes. Tweaking.
You know, water is just water at 211º F. But at 212º it can power a locomotive.
A degree of difference.
And a lot of times, that’s all that’s necessary. Just a degree of difference, just a tweak, just a small shift, can turbo-charge your success and land you at the top of your game.
Think about the recent Winter Olympics at Sochi. The winner of the gold medal in the men’s 500 m had a time of 69.312; the winner of the silver, 69.324.
Tenths of seconds made the difference.
Top golfers like Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson spend huge amounts of time making minute changes to their strokes. Tennis players too like Serena Williams. Top executives, advertisers and marketers split-test their efforts continuously to assess what the nuances are that will impact their sales.
Because nuances matter. Often more than wholesale change.
Sometimes, we look at the road ahead and get overwhelmed about what we think remains to be done to achieve our goals. We can only imagine the road as linear. We can’t see that, by just staying the course a little bit longer, or that by making the tiniest of course adjustments, everything will change in our favor. We can’t see that the finish line is just around the corner or that all of our efforts will suddenly coalesce into that powerful result we’ve been working toward. And we’re sorely tempted to give up.
Even when the tweaks are simple or obvious, we can’t see them. Because we’re just too damn close to see them.
So we need to have faith. And we need to surround ourselves with mentors and coaches and accountability partners who will support us along the way.
Because the truth is that often, with just a few tweaks, we can close the gaps and achieve our most cherished dreams.
So don’t despair. Don’t give up.
Keep tweaking.
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