“Nobody who ever gave his best regretted it.” George Halas.
Okay, you’ve never heard of him in the UK. He was an American football and basketball player and coach, and like many such professionals acknowledged the truth of the saying that people who do their best usually get the results they seek. Although it may be fair to say that the people he was working with and coaching were pretty much ‘up there’ in terms of talent, ability and skill when he described them.
But the fact that they are at the top of their game and are paid good money to be their best, should not absolve or excuse you, underpaid as you are, from doing your best whenever you are called upon to do your job.
No, I wasn’t perfect.
Like you, I had days when I was tired. Periods when I was distracted by events outside of work, and days when in-work issues affected my performance. And a time when I made a huge mistake which cost me dearly.
But, in the main, I tried my best to do the best I could with what I had available to me at the time, including knowledge, ‘things’ supportive and colleagues. Sometimes colleagues didn’t support me – maybe they had their own things going on, too. Who actually ever asks?
Right now, the press has got it in for the police. I have my own observations about what’s going on, and question whether the compassionate, PR-focused approach has gone from being a sensible means of engaging the public to one that utterly undermines our ability to enforce laws and detect crime, and is beset by pandering more towards extra-loud, minority interests. (Without fear or favour…..)
But on a day-to-day basis, and in any one-to-one interaction, I still firmly believe that (without interference) the vast majority of you go to work every day intending to do your best.
And I salute you for it.
Which is why I wrote this book. I hope to help you be the best you can be by counselling you on methodologies designed to enable you to be your best in the moment, by managing those moments with the appropriate level of attention and priority.
If you can manage yourself in such a controlled fashion as to be able to give your best at any one point in time, can’t you do anything other than be your best in the moment?
Think about that.
Police Time Management 