Note: Running Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the PKF Texas – Entrepreneur’s Playbook® page of the PKF Texas website.
Previously we talked about acting with integrity to obtain success beyond success. It’s one thing to say that we choose to act with integrity; it’s another thing to do it. How do make sure we follow through? In a word: discipline.
Discipline allows you to regulate and direct your energy toward your goals in alignment with your values. Discipline is the capacity to maintain awareness and choose consciously in the face of instinctual pressures. The ability to self control yourself to subordinate immediate gratification to long-term objectives is essential for success beyond success.
In his study of companies that went from “good to great,” Jim Collins found that key common factor was the existence of disciplined people, producing disciplined thoughts, and taking disciplined actions. Disciplined companies responded to challenges effectively; they were able to maintain flexibility on a tactical level while remaining firmly anchored in their core mission and value.
As Fred Kofman has written, discipline is a direct consequence of conscious choice and response-ability, the capacity to enact a course of action that is congruent with our purpose and values.