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June 2006 Youth Issue
Autograph with excellence
by Jennifer Shike
“Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it. Autograph your work with excellence.”
I encourage you to evaluate your goals in life. What are your priorities? What sacrifices will you need to make in order to keep focused on your goals? The path to achievement is much easier if you remember to look straight ahead and watch out for the fence posts that try to get in the way!
Sometimes it’s easy to forget that all jobs we do define our character. Yes, it’s true. Even cleaning out the barn. In fact, I believe our character shows most in the small and mundane jobs we do daily.
As a young swine exhibitor, how would you evaluate your self-portrait? The efforts you put in now will pay off in your personal and professional lives.
Here are a few lessons I’ve learned about autographing my work with excellence.
Do the job right the first time. Have you ever been asked to “go get” something you couldn’t find? I dreaded the words “go get” when I was younger. When it came to the livestock or horses, those requests were pretty easy. But when Dad needed something from his tool shop, I was shaking in my boots, because I could never find what he wanted. And Dad always needed me to “go get” when something wasn’t working right or he was in a hurry.
The trip back to tell Dad I couldn’t find what he wanted was always a long one. And, of course, he would get up from what he was working on and go find the tool right away. Doing this job right the first time made life much easier back then, and it still does today.
Are you doing the job right the first time? Sure, we all make mistakes, but set out to do it right the first time and you’ll find that more often than not, you will.
Don’t take shortcuts. Shortcuts rarely work. At first, they seem to make sense – they’ll save you time, cost you less and get you more. However, shortcuts will leave you disappointed more often than not.
When I was 10, I was baby-sitting my younger sister and brother. I decided to pop popcorn on the stove as a treat. After all, we were making our brother endure “The Parent Trap” for the 100th time.
Being the good baby sitter I was, I popped the popcorn between commercials to get back to the movie quickly. I didn’t want to miss the best part! Unfortunately, I skipped the small but important step of putting the popcorn into a bowl.
Maybe you can guess what happened next. I placed the hot popcorn pan on the carpet and we began eating away. Suddenly I realized that the pan was stuck to the carpet! I had melted a big brown circle on mom’s living room carpet. A classic example of a shortcut not “panning” out in my life. A mere 30 seconds more in the kitchen would have avoided this mistake!
Shortcuts don’t work in the livestock industry either. The best stockmen know that good things take time. No magic potion is truly going to make your pig look better in a day or a few hours before the show. And false advertisement of your animal’s appearance will catch you in the end. Take the time needed to make your project a real success.
Make the most of the materials you have. I enjoy listening to judges share stories of their favorite moments. Some are funny, some are heart-wrenching and some leave a mark on your life.
I remember the day I heard about Canaan Sandy from Steve Nichols. When I think about making the most of the materials you have, I think of him.
Canaan was born with Down Syndrome and experienced limitations that other kids didn’t have. Regardless, he made the most of his materials in life, including a winning personality and a positive attitude. He leaned on these materials when he faced physical limitations or people who doubted what he could accomplish with his projects.
He turned to purebred breeders to help him better understand how to feed, show and care for his pig. And most importantly, he turned to his parents for confidence boosts, to drive him to the shows and help him get ready to go into the ring.
Some kids may have stopped trying because they didn’t have the materials other kids had, but Canaan never did. Make the most of your materials.
Leave a quality signature behind. Mark your work with a quality signature that means something – a signature earned over time.
Start working on your signature now. Develop a reputation that people will respect. Don’t get caught up in comparing your work to others; focus on your own.
No matter what job you tackle next, you are leaving an autographed self-portrait behind that somebody will see. Make it one you are proud to sign.
