TENACITY

“Genius is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration” – Thomas Edison

TENACITY is what it takes. Taking that inspiration and working it so persistently that it becomes something great.  A diamond is only formed after persistent high temperature and pressure over about a billion years or so.

Luckily most of our accomplishments don’t take that much persistence but TENACITY is what it takes to make it great.

Consider DynaMed.  There is a lot of inspiration. Providing the most useful information to clinicians at the point of care – providing information in ways that were not done before to meet needs that were not previously met – making evidence-based medicine practical for real-world use. There are many innovations and developments with inspiration of many people that come together to make it happen.

But that is but 1% of what it takes. The TENACITY to seek out the best information, the TENACITY to evaluate it fully for reliability, the TENACITY to keep working at it to make it more clear (it is often most difficult to make it easy and clear when you see how limited and approximate our knowledge is), the TENACITY to discover current information needs as needs change over time and continually adapt and evolve to meet those needs, the TENACITY to keep at it day-in and day-out.  The impact comes from the cumulative INCREMENTAL efforts of many over a long time.