Quote | Purpose and Direction

Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction – John F. Kennedy

I gleaned this quote out of my recent read of The Kennedy Detail (that I reviewed the other day).   Seemed like a fitting quote to start the New Year off right.

What is your purpose and/or direction in your life in 2011?   Where will you go – be it personal, professional, physical health, financial health or mental health?   Do you have a plan, a goal or your own roadmap?  Am I sounding like the Theme from Mahogany yet?

Hopefully between swigging eggnog and digging yourself out of the nationwide blizzards, you’ve had some time to think of questions like these (and others you have asked yourself).

I welcome you to 2011 and wish you all the success in progress towards those goals.

Happy New You Year!

Quote | I don’t need anyone great

During coffee today with a buddy who is a killer sales professional in the staffing world, he shared a quote with me that I just love.   One of his clients was looking for a contract developer to add to his team and offered:

I don’t need anyone great, I need someone to get the work done

Remarkable.  Instead of good to great, we’re going from awesome to good.

Looking for a completely adequate developer?  That’s an awesome strategy for an adequate product, adequate growth and adequate ROI.  Let’s print the t-shirts right now!

I’m all for people who can get work done, but adding average people to your team is never a good idea.  Role players need to be awesome in their jobs as well.

Whether it is and FTE or 10-99, adding someone based on bill rate or salary (to a point, of course) alone is really a bad idea.  Base your decisions – and coach them up to –on what value they can bring.