Always Be Consistent In What You Do

A story is told of a carpenter whose bad attitude cost him a fortune. After he had served his master for some time, the time came for him to move on. But before he left, his master asked him to finish off one of the pieces of furniture, an otherwise expensive piece, that he was making. Out of his bad attitude, he used the worst finishes, workmanship, and material to complete — thinking to himself that it would not affect him in any way. Once he was done, he went to his master’s office to inform him that he had finished his last assignment. Unknown to him, his master had decided to let his worker keep this expensive piece of furniture as his retirement gift. So on hearing that the furniture was done, the master, without inspecting it, extended his hand to his worker, thanked him for his service and informed him that the piece of furniture he was making was his gift. What a blow it ended up being for the worker — he had the opportunity to put in the best workmanship, materials, and finishes, and he did not, instead thinking that he was punishing his master. What a loss it ended up being for him.

The moral of this story is simple — always be consistent in what you do. Always work with passion, applying your best in anything you do. Always look at how what you are doing is impacting the many, not only yourself. This is the lesson I am sharing with you today.

There are many young people whom I engage and guide, but an almost constant trend I see is that they may seem excited in the first 1 or 2 or so months. But once they realize there are no “quick money” solutions, they exit for the next option. Don’t be like that.

For those who give their best every day, keep giving your best and do that which you can build value and create revenue. But if I may ask, what is your long-term vision? Which challenges in your community do you see yourself wanting to address, and what skills would you need for that?

The environment lens offers some opportunities to be tapped by turning challenges into opportunities. Unclean cooking is one area– where if you must have seen from what I share here most of the time, waste recovery to clean cooking fuel briquettes to replace charcoal and firewood use offers an opportunity to tap the community gaps and convert them into a market by providing them with a much better alternative so they can shift their cooking expenditures away from charcoal & firewood into the briquettes. But this is just one area.

The Key is to establish a clear gap in society that you are passionate about addressing, establish the skills you will need to bridge to be able to deliver such solutions, and then move on to bridge these gaps and engage & nurture the community to be a market for taking up your keys.

You have everything it takes to start. Start small while thinking big. Establish the community gap you want to bridge first and start co-creating value for the community. This is how you will lay your foundation of transformation solutions that will impact many.