Raise your game

Take any sporting game. The reason you are on the field is to do your best and to win, otherwise what is the point in turning up day after day, week after week and going through the training. Of course you could say, we're building character by losing every game, but given the choice - most people would prefer to win. And you know I'm right.

If you are on the losing side, what do you have to do in order to win next time around? I'd say one of the best ways is to "raise your game". And the way you raise your game is by having better tactics, more and better training, more enthusiasm, a change of players perhaps - anything that says, we are committed to the next game / round / season and we're going to win.

But it doesn't just apply to sports, but everything we do.

You gain more and better customers by:
Improving your technique, the number of sales calls you make, having better / more products, having the skills and the confidence in yourself and your team, good management, better leadership, a vision to know how you can "win" in these market conditions.

And every day you can raise your own game:
You can improve yourself by doing more today than you did yesterday. You can practice your skills, you can perfect your technique. You can look at something you did a few days ago and if you think it was good - then I'd suggest you're not growing, not changing and not practising hard enough. But if you can look back on something and say, gosh that was terrible - I can do better than that now, then I would agree you can and you are willing to raise your own standards and raise your game. But please do not get me wrong. This is not about perfectionism per se, we still have to finish things and move onto the next level. But we can always strive for perfectionism, even though we will never reach it. The important thing is, we will have achieved more by raising our game than those who settled for average.