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There has been a lot said about the Importance of finding and doing work that you love. It perhaps, became even more mainstream after what is now considered the most popular commencement speech of all time, delivered by Steve Jobs at the 2005 Stanford Commencement event, particularly the following lines:

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle.

Work is important and integral to our lives; there is a great truth to the fact that work fill a large part of our lives because we are going to expend a great chunk of our prime lives working on a job, and hence, it is important that it adds to us, rather than depreciate us, it is vital to enjoy the work you do.

According to a New York Times article quoting The European Journal of Epidemiology, the risk of a heart attack was about 20 percent greater on Mondays for adult men, and 15 percent greater for adult women. ¹ It is not so hard to see the connection; people who are going to jobs they dread, jobs that drains the life and essence out of them will likely dread Monday mornings, and it eventually takes a toll on their health. Harvard Health also released a paper on the same subject with similar findings.²

Who would not like to work on a job that doesn’t feel like work, where work feels like play? But then, it is important to separate the fantasy from the reality because we do not live in an ideal world.

Before you get down to doing the job you love, you’d a likely have had to do a lot of job you might not necessarily love to do. This is an important process for building character.

Everything comes at a price. The non-dream jobs that you have to do is the price for the dream job that you love. While you wait to be worthy of your dream job, the current job you work at should serve as a platform to help you learn and acquire the needed skills, competence, expertise and experience that is needed to get you to become worthy of the job you love. Don’t put forth a wrong attitude to it, don’t make like it is beneath you.

As a rule, don’t give less than your best to anything that your commit your time and attention to. Strength of character is built when you pay as much diligence to your less-than-ideal work, as you would if it were your ideal job. In the words of the great revolutionary, Martin Luther King Junior, ‘if a man has been called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause and say, here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well’.³

While you wait for the dream job, work on your present job like it is the best job that there is. If your job doesn’t give you dignity like you hoped, you can dignify it yourself. It is about whom you become in the process of working. If you do the job, you don’t like with the needed diligence, it will add up to helping you get the job that you want.

To interpret Mr. Jobs’ advice as not taking up any job that is available if it is less than your idea job, will be a complete misrepresentation of what he likely had in mind. Keep looking, don’t settle is not to say you do nothing or pass up less jobs while you are yet to be qualified for that ideal, dream job.

The way to get the job that you love without settling is to take on the job available and work at it as diligently as you would have worked on your ideal job.

So, keep growing, don’t settle; and work on yourself while your work at your job.

1. [https://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/14/health/the-claim-heart-attacks-are-more-common-on-mondays.html]

2. https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/time-sensitive-clues-about-cardiovascular-risk]
3. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21045-if-a-man-is-called-to-be-a-street-sweeper]

Elbert Hubbard’s A Message to Garcia was first written in 1899. At the core of the piece are certain very fundamental truths, which not only made it an instant success at the time, but also partly explains why it has remained a relevant resource till date.

A Message to Garcia was set against the backdrop of the Cuban war, and its key character is a U. S Army officer by the name of Lieutenant Rowan. With the Spanish forces closing in, President McKinley needed to enlist the cooperation of a certain leader of Cuban insurgents named Garcia. The challenge with this was that despite its sophisticated communication gears, the US Army couldn’t get in contact with Garcia because he was hiding on an island where no form of telecommunication existed. If he had to be reached, it had to be in person, and it had to be a covert operation of the highest order.

When President McKinley asked one of his Senior Military advisers to recommend an officer to carry out such a delicate task, only one name popped up; an officer by the name of Rowan.

‘’ When President McKinley gave the letter to Rowan in Washington DC the officer didn’t ask where is he at? How do I get there? What do you want me to do to when I am there? How will I get back? He just took the message and figured out how to get to Garcia. He took a train to New York, a ship to Jamaica, broke the Spanish blockade to get to Cuba in a cell boat, then wild carriage rides, marching and riding through the Cuba jungle. 9 days of travelling later, Rowan got the message to Garcia at 9 in the morning, that same afternoon at 5, he started his return journey to the United States.’’1

Lieutenant Andrew Rowan showed up, executed on the task assigned, and as such helped his country gain an edge on winning the war, by delivering a message to Garcia against all odds.

Although Hubbard’s essay has come some criticism as regards its relevance in the current dispensation, the fact is that: A message to Garcia will forever remain evergreen as it treats core issues that bears fundamental relevance to work and life. Particularly in today’s distracted world, the core thrust of the message to Garcia needs to be taken to heart again.

STRONG WORK ETHICS

A strong work ethic is an attitude an employee applies to their work that indicates a high level of passion for any work they do.2 Strong work ethics cannot be overemphasized. It is highly valuable and still very much in demand. Employers of the 21st century will give an arm and a leg to keep employees who possess viable work ethic.

Great organizations are made by the quality of result they deliver; great results are only possible by employees who have a strong work ethic, and apply themselves to their work optimally.

Individuals with strong work ethics are self-driven towards their goals, and in delivering on tasks, which may make them come across as competitive to their less driven colleagues. However, it is an important quality to have regardless. Cultivating a strong work ethic is a surefire way to set yourself apart and be distinctive in your organization.

It is instructive that of the thousands of professional and highly dedicated officers of the US Army, only one name came up as a good fit for the task of undertaking a very risky and almost impossible expedition. There is no doubt that his work ethic had set him apart in the ranks, and eventually gave him the opportunity to take orders directly from the President of the United States of America.

Every organization needs the kind of people who will take a train when the need calls for it, jump on a ship where necessary, hop on a carriage, hobble through a jungle and do whatever else it may take till they get their work done. It is on the back of such dedication that the organization achieves greatness.

INITIATIVE

Initiative is a very important character trait for success. The first side of initiative is knowing the next course of action to take without any prompt. A lot of times, we wait to be told what to do before making the effort. For some people, it has to be repeated severally before they make the move to execute, this is not the attitude that excels.

The other side to initiative is problem solving. Reverting back to a superior every time a challenge is encountered in the course of a task is very limiting. It distracts the focus of the superior, and undermine productivity.

A Rowan kind of employee learns to work with resources at their disposal; they don’t rely on the management to cross all T’s and dot all I’s rather they take it upon themselves to deliver the task with utmost care, and with little supervision.

PLACING THE RIGHT PEG IN THE RIGHT HOLE

This is another important point from the essay which should be paid some attention because it is easy to overlook. When the president and by extension, the entire nation ran into a precarious situation, and there was need for someone to broker the process that will turn the tide around for good for the nation, the president turns to ask for recommendation. Lieutenant rowan’s name came up.

Given the gravity of the task at hand, there is no doubt that the Colonel could not have put forth anyone whose character or capacity to execute the task raised even the slightest doubt in their minds. This would have turned out to be a great gamble which the nation couldn’t afford.

The message here is for managers and employers to fit the right peg in the right hole. A lot of error and loss to the organization can be avoided when the tasks are delegated to the right candidate with the right level of skill, competence and the needed work ethic to get it done.

The twenty-first century world and the work place need men like Rowan, more than any other time who in the words of Elbert Hubbard ‘’does his work when his boss is away as well as when he is at home. The man when given a letter to Garcia, quietly takes the missive, without asking any idiotic questions and with no lurking intention of chucking it into the nearest suer or of doing odd else but deliver it.

Civilization is just one long anxious search for such individuals. Anything such a man asks will be granted, his kind is so rare, that no employer can afford to let him go. He is wanted in every city, town and village. In every office, shop, store and factory. The world cries out for such. He is needed and needed badly, the man who can carry a message to Garcia’’.

REFERENCES
1. https://gpswealth.com.au/online-newsletter/assets/message-garcia.pdf]
2. https://www.valamis.com/hub/work-ethic]
https://mwi.usma.edu/outdated-message-garcia-hubbards-essay-needs-shelved-good/