The fastest way for an achiever to revert to mediocrity in any endeavor of their calling or profession, is to have no unfinished business. Competitive edge, continuous growth and success, are loosely tied to achieving established goals. The key is to turn yesterday’s goals into today’s routine, it is also the platform you need to set goals that are more challenging, the one that you never thought of yesterday. You must see and set yourself up for a life beyond today’s goals.

This thinking takes me back to Kenya where exams, whether for high school or university admission were outrageously challenging, the pain of limited resources, where a child in elementary school is not guaranteed secondary a education even if they wanted it. Out of my 7th grade class of 125, only 10 of us were fortunate enough to be admitted to government aided schools—by far we were the ones that were promised a glimpse of a better future. In my 120 student, 4-year high school class, 3 of us were admitted to a university based on our academic performance.

But what is more revealing is that you could witness an A student at one level flank miserably in the next. I am not talking of an A student sliding to a B position, but relegated to an F status. Some of those A students were so close to me that their mediocre performance, after a spectacular exhibition, has bothered me for almost three decades.

Yet that is what you see with teams, businesses, and individuals that were once a success story. You see the efforts, the focus, the exceptional customer service and the attention paid to details that helped them climb to the top. You see the fruits when the team, business or an individual is at the top. Then you see that yesterday’s talk of everyone disappear into the unknown with unbelievable speed. You are then left with one question, “What went wrong?”

A team, business or an individual without unfinished business is a finished business—until some serious re-thinking, re-focusing and re-determining of what brought success and how to stay successful, is done and then followed by action.

Here are a few keys on how to stay on top:
 

Was going back to school a goal that you had and have now accomplished? What about using that experience as your footing for the next step? Was writing your first book a goal that is no longer a goal? When are your readers going to read your second book, read your weekly column or enjoy your online presence? Whether your goal was to build strong relationships, a business or lose weight, you have to always have something to live up to that will keep you focused, motivated and growing. That is the recipe, having unfinished business, to help you stay on top.
 

INNOVATION IN COMMUNICATION

The success or failure of your business depends on your company’s ability to connect with consumers and employees and convey your essence and ideas. It requires innovative public relations. Simply R•E•D presentations from four dynamic public relations experts could enhance 50 to 90 percent of your current business relations and thrust revenues higher. Presenters include motivational speaker Vincent Kituku; T. Andrew Fujimoto, chief executive officer of AmeriBen/IEC Group and authority on effective human resources management; Dale Dixon, a media consultant and 16-year veteran of broadcast news; and Karleen Savage, executive director of Code R•E•D Public Relations and marketing/political specialist. You will leave with tools to communicate in new, effective ways. Code R•E•D, a public relations agency offering unique and preventative services, is sponsoring the event. Cost is $129 per person. To register, go online to www.codeREDpr.com and click events. For information, call Savage at 938-3612.
 

9 Guaranteed Styles that Will Capture
Your Audience’s Attentions

You know, have heard or read a sad story of someone who won the lottery only to have his life dive into lows worthy leaving alone. Have you read what happened to many of the winners we saw rush to huge dollars and then seem to disappear to oblivion? They have been Miss Universe or sports players, who leave high school and earn unfathomable millions of dollars playing.

Each of the so many sad endings evokes one of my childhood observations that has refused to free itself from my memory. We lived in Kangundo, Kenya, a relatively high potential area with enough rain to support livestock from season to season. Another area, Yatta, was drier and rain was unpredictable. Livestock owners would keep their animals in Yatta as long as they could, hoping for rains. When these animals condition was pathetic and the hope for rains diminished, the owners opted to take them to areas where there was grass and water.

Watching a newly arrived animal eat, drink and die is one of those experiences that teach more of life than all theoretical classes and life lesson seminars can ever attempt to teach. The cow from drier area just ate whatever it could. When full, the next thing was to walk to the river and drink as much as it could. Cows rest after eating and drinking before continuing to eat. Unfortunately some of those animals never got up from their rest—they died there—killed by what was supposed to make their life better.

The general animal physiology explanation is that the animal in poor condition eats more and what its digestive system can handle. The undigested built-up leads to the production of acid that gets into the blood, gets transported to the brain thus killing it.

The astonishing part of death from instant success is that it can be avoided. Look at the people serving meals in famine stricken communities. The servers don’t just serve whatever is available and in whatever quantities. They start with light meals in portions the digestive system can handle considering the condition of the people. The food, amount and form, is adjusted as the body condition improves. Thousands of people are saved.

Did you know there are great professionals who would have continued enjoying what they did if only they didn’t have instant success in the beginning? Their instant success destroyed their motivation, focus or brought pride that always proceeds a fall.

Then this leads us to some basic wisdom. Enjoy the hardships of your growth—the rejections from publishers, the prospects who don’t return phone calls or email messages, the challenges of lacking the resources you need to get to the next level or the less than spectacular results you are getting from your weight loss efforts.

The dues of hardship that you pay in your learning process might largely be the parameters that will prevent you from “social death” from instant success—since your won’t be instant success. The long-term efforts one devoted in achieving professional and personal success are what makes their success a sweet experience.
 

I could not understand why my father was giving his in-laws the one cow that provided milk for our family. Through family discussions, I had learned that my father's family had given my mother's family more than the traditional token of appreciation, commonly known by the West as dowry.

Since my younger brother and I were the ones asked deliver the cow to my maternal grandparents, I asked dad why—a 17-year old son needed an explanation for the meaning of this transfer. Dad said that when a man is blessed with a good wife, he has to show his in-laws his appreciation from time to time. He mentioned that there was no price for a good wife and the gifts given to in-laws was a continuous way of saying thank you.

Of course tradition of dowry has been misunderstood and misused, especially by those less attached to its significance.

But it is the value of a good wife that has kept my mind thinking of my father's words. I have nursed the knowledge that I been outrageously blessed with a marvelous wife for almost twenty years. That said, the challenge of being in my wife's shoes for few days was humbling and revealing.

For months I knew she would attend a conference for a lengthy period of time-4 days. That meant my being home with two of our three daughters (13 and 10) and son (6). I kept the thoughts of her being absent in the back of mind until I realized I could not ignore the fact I afraid of being home alone.

A week before she left for the conference, she had to leave early in the morning for a meeting. By default I was in-charge of getting the children ready for school. One of them was sick and I had to call my wife to ask which medicine I was to give her. By the time I had found it the sick child and her brother had rushed to the bus. I rushed to the bus too, not only with medicine but also with another form that needed a parent's signature but had slipped my attention. The gracious bus driver just laughed when I said this is parenting 101 as I gave medicine to my daughter and signed the form.

At dinner time that evening, as I bragged at my effectiveness that morning, my daughter told me that I gave her nighttime medicine. Further, my son let me know that the form I labored to sign had been due a month earlier. Oh my! I induced my daughter to sleep in class. And my son had a worthless form signed by me.

Two days before my wife's departure, my daughters surprised me on how concerned they were in having dad as their cook. The 13-ear old one said, "I know what we are going to eat until Mom comes." "Ugali in the first day, followed by Ugali every night." Ugali, corn meal is the meal food in East Africa. Without hesitation, her 10-year old sister looked at me with appealing eyes and said, "I know Dad won't torture us that way. He will get us a pizza." My wife laughed so hard I had to join.

On the day my beloved left, I had to pray for my children while I was still in bed before they left for school-they had prepared themselves. I had not slept the previous night, since I spent it preparing myself mentally to be home alone with children scared of my cooking.

The after school activities were the next test of my parenthood. Knowing that the 13-year old had a basket ball game, I had to pick the other two from their school and head to the game. Out of my heart's goodness, I decided to carry snacks. But the way they found the snacks and just started eating forced me to ask, "Does Mom bring you snacks to eat before you go to the game." And the answer was a definitive "YEAH."

One day with my wife away from home felt like a decade of crisis. My professional creativity and performance recoiled to levels I am ashamed of. What mothers do can only be understood by being in their shoes. Now I understand why dad found fulfillment in giving his in-laws the cow that was invaluable. It was a token of his appreciation for the invaluable child (my mother) they had blessed him with. God bless wives. To order Dr. Kituku’s Slices of Hope and Inspiration, send $10 per book or $40 for the five series (payment includes shipping and handling) to Kituku & Associates, P.O Box 7152, Boise, Idaho 83707. Phone (208) 376-8724 www.kituku.Com
 

Read Dr. Kituku’s newest articles online at: www.kituku.com, Idahopress.com, Casper Star Tribune Idahostatesman.com, Argus Observer, Business IQ, Post Register, Idaho Catholic Register, Idaho Press Tribune, Idaho Senior Citizen News, and Presentations Magazine.

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