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"The ability to be counted on and trusted"
(See also Honesty, Accountability, Honor, Trustworthiness/Loyalty, Respect for Others, Trustworthiness)
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Dependability" CategoriesResources on Dependability
Led
Zeppelin and Jack Welch Show Up, On Time, Every Time
Led Zeppelin took the 1970’s by storm, rising quickly to become, not only one of the most popular bands of their time, but of all time. Their song, Stairway to Heaven, remains one of the most played songs on radio. They’ve sold over 200 million albums worldwide. VH1 ranks them #1 on their chart of “100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock.”
Although they got into their fair share of craziness along the way, they were professional when it came to their music. They determined that they would let nothing come before their music. Here’s an example: according to their manager, during their twelve years of performing, they never missed a performance. Never. Neither were they ever late.
Think of it this way, had they been performing throughout your school career of 12 grades, they would have never been late for a performance. Not once.
You’ll find this as a characteristic of many highly successful people. They show up. On time. Every time.
Jack Welch lead one the largest, most successful companies in the world – General Electric. GE is worth more than the total domestic product of entire countries. Because of Welch’s performance there, he’s considered one of the greatest business leaders of his time.
But before he became president, while he was working his way up through the company, he found ways to separate himself out from the pack. Here’s one thing he did: if he had a business meeting scheduled the next day in another city, but he was afraid that bad weather might delay his flight, he’d fly in the day before.
That attention to showing up, on time and prepared, was a part of what made people know that he could one day lead the company.
From Led Zeppelin to Jack Welch, success people find ways to make their meetings on time. Do you want to get a good education? Now’s a great time to overcome whatever hurdles keep you from showing up from school. Hey, it’s not always easy. But find ways to make it happen and it just might make you successful, whether you want to be a rock star or a business leader.
(Sources:
Stairway to Heaven: Led Zeppelin, Uncensored, by Richard Cole, with
Richard Trubo, HarperCollinsPublishers, 1992, p. 377.)
Top
Athletes Show Up for Practice
Michael Jordan is considered by many to be the best basketball player to ever play the game. But it wasn’t all just raw talent. He trained relentlessly. Even at the top of his career, when everyone saw him as the best, most valuable player on his team, he didn’t use his fame as an excuse to get sloppy in practice. According to Stacy King, one of his teammates with the Chicago Bulls:
“He came to work every day. He didn’t use his superstar status to skip practice. MJ was always at practice. For someone like myself, I couldn’t call in sick with a toe injury. If Michael Jordan could get pounded on every night and then come to practice to run sprints and go through a full practice the next day, guys like myself and B.J. Armstrong couldn’t think about missing practice. He had tremendous talent, but he was ultra competitive and had a great work ethic.” http://newsok.com/article/3401884
In football, you see this work ethic in successful players
like Quarterbacks Tom Brady for New England and Matt Ryan for the Atlanta
Falcons. They show up for all the optional, off-season conditioning. They keep
practicing plays after the regular practice. Ryan has the game plan sent to him
before the first day of practice, so that he can start studying it early.
A part of success is simply showing up. That goes for school too. I know that you have those days when you can think of a million things you’d rather do than hop on that bus. But I challenge you to do it anyway. Keep showing up. For successful people, that’s a huge part of their success.
Semper Fi - Always Faithful
The Marines are one of the U.S. military's super tough special operations units. If you look closely at their emblem, you'll see an eagle holding a banner, which reads ''Semper Fi.'' It's an abbreviation of the Latin phrase Semper Fidelis, which means ''Always Faithful.'' Where did it come from?
According to Leatherneck: Magazine of the Marines, after the Beirut bombing in 1983, General Paul X. Kelley visited a wounded Marine in the hospital. The young man shook the General's hand and scribbled the words ''Semper Fi'' on a piece of paper. The general became emotional and said, ''Lord, where do we get such men?''The official Marine Corp site explains that Semper Fi describes their commitment to each other, their organization, and their country. After Marines pulled off their recent (during the war with Iraq) daring rescue of 7 American soldiers from behind enemy lines, two of them accompanied the former POW's to safety in Kuwait. The Marines could have requested some rest and relaxation, hoping to hang out in Kuwait
to bask in their glory. After all, they'd already risked their lives. Instead, the next morning, the two Marines requested to be flown back to the battlefield as soon as possible. One explained, ''We have to get to our unit. There is still fighting. We can't miss that." Wow! Now that's faithfulness to a difficult, dangerous task. But that's what we expect of the Marines. Semper Fi - Always Faithful.Do you feel like life's knocked you for a loop this week? What task looms before you today that seems too big to bear? Is it tougher than running through deserts with heavy artillery? Is it more dangerous than attempting a rescue behind enemy lines? Perhaps it wouldn't hurt us to adopt the Marine attitude of Semper Fi in our daily lives. No matter what happens, no matter how hard life gets, I challenge you to repeat to your last breath, Semper Fi - always faithful.
Discussion Questions
1) What does Semper Fi mean?
2) Why do you think it's so important for a
Marine to be faithful, dependable in his or her duties?
3) A Marine expects an assignment to be tough. Us
civilians often expect life to be easy. How do you think our expectations of
life make it either easier or more difficult to be dependable in difficult tasks? (If we
expect life to be easy, we're more easily discouraged when surprised with hard
times.)
4) How do you feel when someone promises to come through on something (like a
group project or to take you somewhere), but doesn't come through?
5) How can we grow to be more dependable?
Old Faithful is not the biggest geyser, nor does it reach the greatest height. Nevertheless it is by far the most popular geyser. Its popularity is due mainly to its regularity and dependability. You can count on Old Faithful. Nothing in life can take the place of faithfulness and dependability. It is one of the greatest virtues. Brilliance, genius, competence – all are subservient to the quality of faithfulness. ( Wallace Friday)
“A small thing is a small thing, but faithfulness in a small thing is a great thing.” (Hudson Taylor)
Don't Be Dogmatic About Things You're Not Sure Of
Not all statements, even by authorities, not even in writing, are dependable. We have to develop our judgment in order to know who we can depend upon. (You could also use these to show how silly we look when we say things that prove us to be not dependable.
Need more resources on "Dependability"? See also our related categories: Honesty, Accountability, Honor, Trustworthiness/Loyalty, Respect for Others, Trustworthiness .