A presentation to the 16th National Convention of Administrative and Personnel Officers of State Colleges and Universities at Grand Regal Hotel, Bacolod City.

Click here to see our power point presentation excellence in the workplace

PEOPLE EXCELLENCE IN THE WORKPLACE: Going Beyond Mediocrity


Everyday Excellence looks at the core of quality – people.

BIBLICAL BACKGROUND OF PEOPLE EXCELLENCE AT WORK:

The theme of excellence in work is as old as the Bible (Prov. 22:29). In fact, EXCELLENCE is one of the keys to a biblical view of “work”: • God does His work with excellence. When He created the world, the end result was “very good” (Gen. 1:31).

God equips people with specific skills and abilities that fit them for certain kinds of work (see “You Are Unique” at Ex. 31:1-11, and “You Are Unique” at Ps. 33:15). He wants us to use our skills for their intended purposes, thereby serving Him with all our mind and might (Matt. 22:37-38).

Christians are to do their work as if Christ Himself were evaluating the effort-because He is (Eph. 6:5-8; see “Who’s the Boss” at Col. 3:22-24).

Christians are commanded to be “well pleasing in all things” in their work, because doing so makes the gospel of Christ attractive to coworkers and customers (see “Your ‘Workstyle’ ” at Titus 2:9-10).

 

DEVELOPING EXCELLENCE IN THE WORKPLACE

 

Why do some people seem to enjoy their work and achieve excellence more at work? Why do some people complete more at work than the others? The answer to these questions boils down to – people attitude. Let me share with you various qualities of people which contributes to excellence in the workplace.

1.MATURITY

Its quite surprising to see the number of immature people we have in the workplace nowadays. The tantrums, the yelling, the throwing of things and outright expression of emotions that is detrimental to work and the office environment. Emotional maturity is an expected trait in the workplace, especially when excellence is expected at work.To be mature at work is a way of bringing excellence in the workplace. To be mature means, you are very self-aware of the how you feel about yourself. This self-awareness makes you conscious about your feelings and why you feel the way you feel. You put it under control or you do not feel the need to show it so openly that it affects your colleagues in the workplace. You must know the demonstration of these emotions can affect the morale of people around you. If you want to bring excellence in the workplace, learn to adjust, modulate and direct your emotions. Think before acting and understand that your actions can affect the rest, especially team member who works closely with you. How can someone approach you if they feel you are in a foul mood and days on ends? How effective and efficient can you be then? How will people around you achieve excellence in the workplace? Learn to change as this will ensure that excellence in the workplace can surface. When you are open to change, the path opens to the opportunity that never presented itself as everyone is fearful including yourself. It’s just something you never noticed due to all the drama from immaturity. It is something you did not realize and the time to reflect upon your actions. Maturity allows you to understand that passion and persistence to pursue goals at work beyond monetary returns gives you a purpose of service in life. With passion, persistence and patience, excellence can be achieved in the workplace. You as an individual can inspire the rest to show their best at work without even trying too hard because you would have already created the environment to do so. When you behave maturely at work, you become discerning. You know small acts can carry big meanings. Just like a mother who pats and encourages a child. A small act but it helps the child build confidence. Maturity brings excellence in the workplace because it allows you to respect and appreciate the work others do, and not look at it as an action to gain favors. More importantly ego is parked aside because of the level of maturity as a professional. Maturity must exist if you want to have excellence in the workplace. A workplace that is filled with people who are mature, ask how things can be done better. They do not ask why it is not done my way.

2.KNOW WHY YOU ARE THERE

Manage yourself by knowing your roles and responsibilities in your company. In addition, learn to know what it takes to go a step beyond what your current role entails. Know what makes you a competitive advantage to your boss and your fellow workers

3. FOSTERING A MANAGERIAL ATTITUDE

Excellent workers must possess a managerial attitude even if they don’t have the title. One must have the attitude like a manager and see to it that things are done the way they are supposed to be done. Manage expectations of everyone in the team from the boss to colleagues and peers within the department. Stick to timelines; follow up with next steps after every meeting, have progress reports ready even if they are informal ones like an email.

4. EFFECTIVE TIME MANAGEMENT

Manage your time well and know how to prioritize. Know when to do what. Do not procrastinate on work especially when they involve cross-department participation. Your delay will affect other people’s work. Great employees know how to manage their time well and even manage their boss’s time well.

5. Work To Get Results 

Work with objectives in mind. What is the overall objective of the project? Work towards the aim that everyone who is involved in a project big or small has a role. Everyone must contribute towards that goal. You must learn to get results and expect the high performance of yourself. Do not just do enough to get by. This is one of the most important “great employee qualities”.

6. DEVELOP A PASSION FOR EXCELLENCE

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”(Aristotle) Excellent workers have the spirit to do outstanding work. They set the pace for others to follow. If you want to be great at what you do, look for ways to outdo yourself. Be the best that you can be. Even if perfection is elusive, go out and get it. Develop your passion for excellence.

Passion for Excellence: Outdo Yourself, Be the Number One!

A. Set Your Goal Have an ambition of where you want to be and what you want to do. Many people think they know what they want. Very often they say they want to be number one. Well, what does it mean to be number one for you? Is it to become the best in your industry? Is it to become the best in your company? Or is it in your department? Does number one naturally equate to be on top? What does it take to be number one can mean excelling, it can mean being the best and it can mean being on top. Have you considered that you can be the best and yet not be on top? Or you can be on top and yet not be the best? Being number one can mean overcoming your own weaknesses. Regardless, you need to have a clear ambition. When you are clear, focus on it and believe in it. Believe in yourself and you will succeed in the pursuit of this ambition. Ask yourself what are you willing to do in order to reach this ambition? What it take to be number one is a lot of sacrifices, struggle, and painful self-assessment. Can you do all these and remind yourself of the price you promised you would pay to arrive at it even when the going gets tough?

B. Act Upon Your Goal Many people fail to be number one because they fail to DO. People forget that the work part is what will get them to be number one. To be number one in any field takes a lot of hard work. It isn’t fun at all. It takes effort, consistent hard work and it is a constant struggle. The only thing that keeps you going is the dogged focus on being number one. Having a belief without action is just plain fantasy. Nothing will ever come true.

Create a plan that you can work on based on intensity of hard work, integrity of character and initiatives of ideas to propel growth. Propel the growth not only for yourself but also for the company.

What it takes to be number one is also a winning attitude. A winning attitude will always win over the plotting and scheming in the corporate world. To be number one in the corporate world is to act upon your ambition with pride, passion, and belief. Always match this wining attitude to the plan you have created and you have half the formula on what it takes to be number one. 

C. Accept Setbacks As Part of Work Life Accept that there will be setbacks on your way to being number one. No one will tell you what it takes to be number one without warning you about the number of setbacks you will have to take in your stride. Setbacks are part of life and definitely part of work life. When it happens, do not beat yourself over it. Mistakes happen, sometimes it is your fault, and sometimes we suffer for other people’s mistakes. That’s just part of life. But that’s no reason to be disillusioned and give up on your ambition. You may get a bad evaluation and that is just part and parcel of the working world. When that happens, reflect upon it. What caused it, what can be done to avoid it in the future? Take personal responsibility for it if you caused the mistake. Put in place a system so you can improve and learn from that lesson.

D. Do not Give up and Keep Going Just when you feel like giving up, that’s when you tell yourself you must continue. What it takes to be number one also includes painful self-assessments. There will be things we are weak at and have to work on. Accept that fact and be willing to struggle to improve those weaknesses. What it takes to be number one is more than a plan. It is hard work and not giving up and accepting setbacks. It is also knowing that there are no failures and the only time one fails is when one stops doing. Do not ever be tempted to plot and scheme your way through the corporate world. Time is better spent in being your best.

Just when you feel like giving up, that’s when you tell yourself you must continue. What it takes to be number one also includes painful self-assessments. There will be things we are weak at and have to work on. Accept that fact and be willing to struggle to improve those weaknesses. What it takes to be number one is more than a plan. It is hard work and not giving up and accepting setbacks. It is also knowing that there are no failures and the only time one fails is when one stops doing. Do not ever be tempted to plot and scheme your way through the corporate world. Time is better spent in being your best.

7. HAVE A “CAN DO” ATTITUDE  Ever worked with someone who is always so negative, that everything is impossible, nothing is easy, things are too troublesome and a million other excuses and reasons why things won’t work? Do you catch yourself making the same mistake? Have a “Can Do” attitude. Have the courage and patience to work things out and figure things out even if it sounds very challenging. Bosses trust people who have a “Can Do” attitude in approaching work.

Ever worked with someone who is always so negative, that everything is impossible, nothing is easy, things are too troublesome and a million other excuses and reasons why things won’t work? Do you catch yourself making the same mistake? Have a “Can Do” attitude. Have the courage and patience to work things out and figure things out even if it sounds very challenging. Bosses trust people who have a “Can Do” attitude in approaching work.

 Ever worked with someone who is always so negative, that everything is impossible, nothing is easy, things are too troublesome and a million other excuses and reasons why things won’t work? Do you catch yourself making the same mistake? Have a “Can Do” attitude. Have the courage and patience to work things out and figure things out even if it sounds very challenging. Bosses trust people who have a “Can Do” attitude in approaching work.

8. ENJOY YOUR WORK Doing what you love is the cornerstone of having abundance in your life.(Dr. Wayne Dyer) Even if it means a routine work, as they know each step and each detail builds on another and helps achieve the company objective. Someone who enjoys their work will naturally bring their best to work. I feel sorry for the person who can’t get genuinely excited about his work. Not only will he never be satisfied, but he will never achieve anything worthwhile.( Walter Chrysler)

Doing what you love is the cornerstone of having abundance in your life.(Dr. Wayne Dyer) Even if it means a routine work, as they know each step and each detail builds on another and helps achieve the company objective. Someone who enjoys their work will naturally bring their best to work. I feel sorry for the person who can’t get genuinely excited about his work. Not only will he never be satisfied, but he will never achieve anything worthwhile.( Walter Chrysler)

9. CONTRIBUTE POSITIVELY A great employee takes personal responsibility for everything they do. To be a great employee you must contribute positively to the organization. Take initiatives, give suggestions, or even be the silent hero who solves challenges quietly, that is how a great employee works. They work to help achieve greater goals for the organization.

A great employee takes personal responsibility for everything they do. To be a great employee, you must contribute positively to the organization. Take initiatives, give suggestions, or even be the silent hero who solves challenges quietly, that is how a great employee works. They work to help achieve greater goals for the organization.

10. HEALTHY WORK RELATIONSHIPS Being nice to people and have great working relationships across departments and ranks is one of the important great employee qualities. It means you can get a lot more cooperation and strong network to help you get your work done. Hence, making your boss look good in the eyes of management. Your boss will have less people problems too. Do you have these great employee qualities? Perhaps you already have them and what you need is a plan to bring them to be noticed. If you don’t, start to see which of these qualities you can adopt and start on first. It will help you move up the corporate ladder a little easier.

Being nice to people and have great working relationships across departments and ranks is one of the important great employee qualities. It means you can get a lot more cooperation and a strong network to help you get your work done. Hence, making your boss look good in the eyes of management. Your boss will have fewer people problems too. Do you have these great employee qualities? Perhaps you already have them and what you need is a plan to bring them to be noticed. If you don’t, start to see which of these qualities you can adopt and start on first. It will help you move up the corporate ladder a little easier.

CONCLUSION

If we want to achieve everyday excellence, we must do it for people and with people. People either have the right attitude or they don’t. They take the right action, or they don’t. They appreciate what they receive, or they don’t. “Attitude, action and appreciation” actually form a cycle of excellence, since appreciation often stimulates, fosters, and encourages a better attitude. It all comes down to how we approach ourselves and how we interact with other people. Once we look for them, we find that the opportunities to practice and apply excellence in the workplace occur minute-by-minute throughout the day. These moments comprise the heart of everyday excellence. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?

 

 

38 Comments

  1. Jude Michael Belicano

    “having belief without action is just plain fantasy” , nothing will happen if you will not act upon your ambition so always do your best to achieve them. And just like what they say “struggle is real”, so bear with it and continue to reach your goal.

  2. -Rhea L. Leduna-
    Excellence in the Workplace is very important to the work or practice setting where the employee promotes professional autonomy and enhanced work environment. It helps everybody to have healthy relationships with their co-workers to achieve the success of every organization.

  3. Rasha Mustafa

    If you love your job you can be more excellent than what you think.Be positive,be prepared you have to be always on the go, Even if you already have a job dont stop studying and reading.

  4. Maturity must exist if you want to have excellence in the workplace. A workplace that is filled with people who are mature, ask how things can be done better. They do not ask why it is not done my way.

  5. Richve A. Dema-ala

    This is an enlightening article that reminds us young professional to man up with our responsibilities, to balance play and work without compromising achieving the goal. The tips of how to achieve these is very nurturing specially the tips on Time management which i believe is one of the key role on achieving some else’s goal. In this age of social media that lure tired and stressed out young professional to complacency .

  6. Karen P. Montellano

    A positive, can- do attitude is a real point. Pride in your own work and a desire to give your best goes a long way to achieve excellence.

  7. Rodena Zuniga Vilches

    Positivity and right attitude is the key in achieving excellence in workplace. People more likely to stay in an organization if they love what they are doing.
    -HRM2015

  8. Ma. febe Legaspi

    2 tips that I can give you.
    First, don’t settle yourself in meritocracy, always remember to strive hard and go for gold.
    Second, remind yourself of the 1st tip.
    Ma. Febe Legaspi
    HR 2015

    • Ma. febe Legaspi

      2 tips that I can give.
      First, don’t settle yourself in mediocrity, always remember to strive hard and go for gold.
      Second, remind yourself of the 1st tip.
      Ma. Febe Legaspi
      HR 2015

  9. Christy Mae Tenila

    For me, if you want to bring excellence in the workplace, learn to adjust, modulate and direct your emotions. Think before acting and understand that your actions can affect the rest, especially team member who works closely with you.HRM2015

  10. Leidor Cuenza

    Great read. Humans are competitive by nature and would always aim for being excellent in their respective fields. If triggered correctly every employee can be passionate on their jobs and would strive for excellence.

  11. Grace Tanjusay

    Ability is what a person is capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do and ATTITUDE determines how well you do it. – HRM2015

  12. Marvin Panes

    “Can do” never limit your self on what you can do,, always have a positive mind set in every unwanted situation in work place.. Always have a go go go attitude

  13. A great person once said to me, “The reason why we exist in our jobs are because of problems, the moment there wouldn’t be any problems there is no reason for us to work”. This is the moment I realized WHY AM I THERE. My company has provided me with all the tools and equipment for my skills and specializations to prevent such problems to arise. But as my saying goes on the previous article, there is always room for improvement. Likewise, there is always room for errors. Which entirely means that problems will always be around.

    Antonio Jose Ferraris HRM2015

  14. Ruth Angila Vaflor

    I am a perfectionist by nature so i can relate to the concept of excellence. I alway try to do my very best to make a difference in the organization. Excellent work is always noticed and appreciated by superiors and if i get lucky their superiors.

    HR2015

  15. Jeli Grace Alvarez

    Excellence in work place can be achieved by having the right attitude and building good working relationship. And just having a postive outlook goes a long way.

  16. Ignacio C. Eboseo Jr.

    IGNACIO C. EBOSEO , HR 2015
    Skills and attitudes are the factors that will give impact to the development in the workplace. 🙂

  17. Rizza Rebadomia

    Know Why You Are There. Sometimes, all it takes is having that sense of responsibility to achieve excellence. If you have a clear understanding of your responsibilities, achieving excellence shouldn’t be that tough. Brilliant tips, sir! (HR2015)

  18. Personally, it all boils down to teamwork to achieve Excellence! In an organization, you are not working alone, you are with your group.

  19. Mai Hernandez

    One must have a positive attitude, passion, and love for the job. If we set our mind and heart into it, we can be excellent in our work place. Good read, thanks!

  20. Carlo Magno

    Hard work with good values will lead genuine result. Gaining more experience and by observing people who achieved excellence, we can identify a certain pattern that lead to success, a pattern of certain principles and beliefs. When we acted in accordance to these, we will achieved excellence.

    C. Magno

  21. Jo Cherryl Javellana

    I like what you said about enjoying your work. I think it would be hard to achieve excellence if you don’t like what you are doing in the first place. It amazes me every time I see people who are doing menial jobs very happy with what they are doing as oppose to those who hold high positions in companies who couldn’t sleep at night(because they work night shift, just kidding!) because they hate their jobs.

  22. Being No.1 should always be the objective, when the time comes that you are not, find a way to put yourself back at No.1.

  23. Joel Lagunilla

    I Believe that procrastination is the biggest problem that us in government agencies are doing. This is true since we are not really time bound. Further some people do this (delay things) to ask for something in favor. In short ” e ang Lagay e” attitude of scrupulous people. Hehehe…

  24. Reggie M. Agabon

    Set Objectives clearly from the beginning to achieve Excellence not only in the workplace but Excellence in general.

  25. Really excellence in the workplace starts with the end of the mind. It’s worth it.

  26. Yvette D. Ybanez

    If you love what you do and do what you love; and if you learn from your mistakes and strive harder to achieve your goals- then it makes you an excellent person.

  27. Striving for excellence in the workplace starts when the employee has specific goals.

  28. "If you are going to achieve in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude." — Colin Powell

  29. its important that excellence is practice in an organization.this kind of attitude will lead to customer satisfaction thus resulting to organizations long term success..

  30. I am pretty sure the boss will always be happy to hear if you know how to try things even if you don't have any idea how to do it at all. If mistake happens, then learning comes in.

  31. Ilyn Rose V. Calantas

    In order to achieve EXCELLENCE, you should deal great people with great attitude at great time & place.

  32. niiiiice…i learned a lot.. the small fonts made it hard to read but as the article says " have a can do attitude" , see..i learned. the whole article is worth reading..thanks!

  33. so true-maturity at work as well as in life saves us from emotional breakdown.Great article.its help us to learn more on people dynamics……

  34. great article!

  35. This post is worth everyone's attention. When can I find out more? This is a great article. Please visit my site at http://nuboii.blogspot.com.

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