There are many views about what people see as progress. Here are some of the most common views.
Some see it as gaining money, recognition, promotion or other definitions of success. They may also compare themselves to others in terms of achieving certain kinds of prizes or status.
Some see it following their vocation, expressing this through various vehicles and aiming to do valuable work. They may aim to build on their strengths, do superb work and achieve their picture of success.
Some see it as: a) to keep following their principles; b) to keep improving and progressing in the way they translate these into practice; c) to keep doing their best to achieve positive results.
The following section explores how to follow the latter approach. This is a route followed by people in many different fields.
A spiritual person may aim to follow the principles embodied in pursuing a certain path – such as being grateful, being kind and serving their faith during their life.
A recovering addict may aim to follow the principles embodied in a recovery programme – such as taking responsibility, helping others and staying healthy one day at a time.
An athlete may aim to follow the principles embodied in being competitive when it matters – such a preparing properly, doing their best and achieving peak performance.
Imagine you want to follow this approach in your own way. Let’s explore how you can focus on the principles, practice and positive results.
Principles
The first step is to clarify the principles you want to follow in your life or work. Different people will aim to follow different principles. They may aim, for example:
To be grateful … To be kind … To encourage people … To enjoy life … To work for social justice … To create beauty … To do work that inspires people … To pass on knowledge … To help people to succeed … To care for the planet.
Imagine that you have clarified some of the principles you want to follow. Bearing these in mind, it can be useful:
To focus on one of the principles that you want to follow;
To clarify how you want to translate this principle into practice in a specific situation;
To clarify how you can improve the way you translate this principle into practice and continue to progress.
Imagine that you have chosen a specific situation where you want to follow one of your principles. You can then move on to the next step.
Progress
People like to feel they are progressing in their lives and work. As mentioned earlier, different people have different views about what constitutes progress.
Some see it as improving the way they translate their personal principles into practice.
Some see it as improving the way they follow their professional principles and perform superb work.
Some see it as improving their personal status, public recognition or achievements in terms of gaining prizes.
Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer described how many knowledge workers saw progress in their book The Progress Principle. They researched over 12,000 people to explore what individuals found motivating in their daily work.
Below is an excerpt from a piece they wrote for the Harvard Business Review.
Early on, we realized that a central driver of creative, productive performance was the quality of a person’s inner work life – the mix of emotions, motivations, and perceptions over the course of a workday.
How happy workers feel; how motivated they are by an intrinsic interest in the work; how positively they view their organization, their management, their team, their work, and themselves – all these combine either to push them to higher levels of achievement or to drag them down.
Through exhaustive analysis of diaries kept by knowledge workers, we discovered the progress principle.
Of all the things that can boost emotions, motivation, and perceptions during a workday, the single most important is making progress in meaningful work. And the more frequently people experience that sense of progress, the more likely they are to be creatively productive in the long run.
Whether they are trying to solve a major scientific mystery or simply produce a high-quality product or service, everyday progress – even a small win – can make= the difference in how they feel and perform.
A person’s inner work life on a given day fuels his or her performance for the day and can even affect performance the next day.
Imagine that you have clarified the principle you want to follow. It can be useful to explore the following questions.
What is the specific situation where I want to translate this principle in practice? What are the positive results I want to achieve in the situation? What will be the benefits of achieving these results?
How can I translate the principle into practice? How can I perform superbly? How can I keep improving when translating this principle into practice?
Great workers rehearse properly before going into a situation. You will do this in your own way. Moving into action, you will then aim to be fully present, follow your principles and perform superb work.
You may also aim to embody Kaizen – the concept of continuous improvement. Bearing this in mind, it will be important to keep reading reality and aiming:
To keep focusing on the results to achieve;
To keep building on what is working;
To keep tackling areas for improvement.
People who take these steps are more likely to make progress. Sometimes this involves them making small improvements. Sometimes it involves making bigger transformational improvements.
Imagine that you have taking some of these steps. These may then lead to the next stage.
Positive Results
Different people produce different kinds of positive results. Here is a summary of what two individuals said when describing what they saw as progress.
Person A
“I have been sober now for 365 days. It was a year ago that I stopped drinking. Since then I have been able to rebuild a good relationship with my former partner.
“This has resulted in being able to spend more time with my eight-year-old daughter. I am finding life more rewarding – though sometimes I need help to deal with some of the struggles.”
Person B
“I gave up my job in the C-Suite and took another role in my present organisation. This meant going back to the kind of work I love – helping customers to solve problems and achieve success.
“I now spend 80% of my time doing stimulating work with customers. Previously I was told to spend that amount of time on internal matters. I now feel more alive and have also returned to playing music in a band.”
Imagine that you are translating one of your principles into practice and aiming to make progress. You will have your own definition of what constitutes positive results.
You may aim to enjoy life, be better at your craft, write articles that inspire people, raise money for charity or overcome certain challenges. You may aim to improve the way you help people, complete a creative project, achieve certain personal goals or enjoy a sense of peace.
If you wish, try tackling the exercise on this theme. This invites you to describe how you may want to follow the principles approach in your way.
Looking ahead, what may be the principle you want to follow in your life or work? How can you translate this into practice and continue to progress? What may happen as a result of taking these steps?
Here is the exercise on this theme. It invites you to complete the following sentences.
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