Discipline in Business

Discipline in Business. It’s Advantages and Limitations

By: Ernie Fazio

 

One of the traits of the successful people we know is discipline. The ability to set out on a task, develop a strategy and create a time goal for achieving that task.

One of the traits of the successful people we know is discipline. The ability to set out on a task, develop a strategy and create a time goal for achieving that task.

In 99% of the cases that works out just fine, but it is not the whole story. The old Bell System (AT&T) years ago had every possible procedure delineated and printed in these volumes that were issued to every craft. The switchmen had their books, as did the splicers, linemen, galvanometer testers, and all the other various crafts.

Did the craftsman vary from those instructions? Not usually, but occasionally someone would look at a task and say “I think I can do this better” or “I can do this faster” or “I can do this job using less material”.

We all know what this called. It is what we know as “thinking out of the box. “

However when we try a new procedure we risk failure because we are not considering a possibility that was apparent to the person who wrote the manual, but is not obvious to you. So you see discipline is required most of the time in order to get things done. But the risk taker can brings us to a radically different place.

A good example of that dramatic change can be found in the automobile. For many years we made the cars that we drive incrementally better. Then Elan Musk came along and scrapped most of the mechanical technology that we knew and developed the electric car by integrating, modern batteries, modern motor technology, computers and all the peripheral electrical technology to support the new electric car. (The concept of the electric car is not new)

The risk taker is the “outside the box” guy. It takes intelligence, knowledge, and the ability to stand criticism to be that person. But it also takes a solid record of disciplined success in order to have continued credibility.