THE 3D PRINCIPLES OF SUCCESS

The Question

Advisor Owen Katongo Kabanda, are there key principles that someone can utilize in School, at Work, and in Business to help them succeed in their endeavours and be outstanding rather than average?

The 3D Principles

If you are in school, at work, or in business or pursuing whatever endeavours of life, if you want to succeed, there are certain principles that are almost universally utilised by successful people as follows:

(1) Decision Making

One of the most difficult thing for many people is decision making. Some people have a tendency to go round and round in cycles avoiding to do that which they need to do which is, make a decision.

You see, decision making is an executive function of the brain and if you find yourself always failing to be decided about anything, simply know that this part of the brain is highly unutilized.

One can be in School for instance and instead of making a decision to sit down and study, they keep on finding flimsy reasons as to why they cannot study at that particular point only to wait for the deadline when they go in panic mode.

At Work, you can be an employee given work by your bosses and you keep on putting it aside until your boss shouts. Something might go wrong in your area of work but you fail to decide to report it and so on.

You can be the Leader of an institution, things need to be done, yet you keep on doing analysis after analysis of the situation. As a leader, “you have to decide to decide” and at least move to the next level. Leadership calls for decision making even taking tough decisions.

In Business, you think of a strategy to use, your employee brings you a brilliant idea or you see the apparent competition coming but you fail to make a decision. You comfort yourself that you are analysing things.

(a) Decide to Make a Decision

If your intention is to succeed at anything in life, you have to start utilizing the executive function of the brain and make decisions. Decide to make decisions without going too much in cycles.

Many times you will fail to make a decision because you are afraid of the consequences of the so called wrong decision. It is however much better to make the so called wrong decision than be undecided at all.

It is important to emphasise here however that, it is important that you consider all the necessary information available to you and review possible outcomes but in the end, decide to decide or choose the most favourable option or course of action and move on.

(b) Decide to Act

If you do not take action, the whole time of analysing and analysing of issues will lead to absolutely nothing but a false sense of achievement that you analysed an issue.

Successful people in Schools, at Work, and in Businesses are those who decided to ACT. Successful people believe in one thing, that is, think about something, and decide to act on it accordingly.

The world is full of people who decided to act and became or are outstanding. Think of Messi and Ronaldo in football, Nelson Mandela, the young President Macron of France, P-Square of Nigeria, Strive Masiwa and many of your local and international successful people.

One thing about successful men and women in this world is that they are people who decide to take action. Taking action means you have to DO THAT WHICH YOU SHOULD DO. That is, do not expect success to come to you if you are not willing to do what it takes to succeed.

Deciding to act means doing the very thing you might not want to do. If it means studying, training on the field, sacrificing your time and pleasures and many less pleasant things, decide to do it.

(2) Discipline to Follow Through

Deciding to do something could be the easier part of the 3D Principles because it is a psychological part which happens in your head and you can easily think differently about an issue.

When you make the decision about anything in your School, Work or Business, you now need the discipline to follow through and respect the decision you made.

Discipline entails that you stick to your course of action. There of course a lot of distractions that shall come your way and a lot of doubts on the way as to whether you should continue or not. Discipline will be the antidote in that situation.

Successful people are disciplined, they train, they rehearse, the over prepare and do the painful things that many people choose not even attempt to do.

What you see and admire about the successful people are only the results. Take time to think about what they do and what they have to go through in the background.

Discipline to do the things that you might not want to do or feel lazy about is key to success in your life.

(3) Dedication to Your Decision

You decided to do something in your life, and you decided you will be disciplined about it, good. One thing however that you can be assured of is that, at some point, the motivation feeling may wear off.

You see, the way the brain and the entire nervous system was designed, for survival purposes, the system is designed to reduce its response rate to some stimuli over a period of time.

Take for instance, when it is cold and you walk into a warm room, you will feel the difference immediately. Afterwards however, your system adjusts and you do not feel the warm difference anymore. The system reduces its response rate to the warmth stimuli in the room.

In the same manner, when you decide to do something to succeed in life, chemicals are release into your system that makes motivated about doing something. In due time however, this excitement starts to wear off as less of those chemicals get to be produced.

It is when the feelings of motivation and desire to do something reduces that you need to remind yourself of the reasons you decided to do something in the first place.

To this effect, it is important that you DEDICATE YOURSELF to the decision you made earlier and soldier on. Being dedicated to the things you decided to do soon makes you develop a “Personal Brand”.

Being dedicated to the decision you made means that you keep reminding yourself why you have to do something and then keep on pressing on despite all the drawbacks. The rewards are immense.

Closing Remarks

Being successful at whatever you may want to do in life requires that you become used to making decisions. People who are undecided about anything in life do not end up anywhere but average.

When you decide to do something, remember to be disciplined to follow through with your decision. It is not easy but it is worth it. When your zeal starts to wear off, dedicate yourself back to the decision.

There is always going to be challenges along your path to greatness in any of the endeavours of your life, the key thing is for you to decide to act and soldier on.

Whatever you do, remember to also celebrate with your team the achievements you make along the way. Success is a journey and not simply a destination. Each stage you shall reach shall require new decisions to be made. All the best and wishing lots of success!

----------------------------<End>----------------------------

The author is a Business & Human Resources Advisor. Visit his LinkedIn profile or simply search on Google for Owen Katongo Kabanda to access more professional insights and articles.

Feel free to “like”, leave comments, and share the articles with your network connections, colleagues, and family members among others who you think might benefit from the same.

For all your Business, Employer, and Employee matters, do not hesitate to get in touch:

Owen Katongo Kabanda

Business & Human Resources Advisor

Skype: Owen K. Kabanda

Twitter: @OwenKabanda

Email: [email protected]

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/owenkkabanda

LinkedIn: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/owenkkabanda