One Small Step Leads to a Giant Leap on Earth

George Krueger & Mary-Lynn Foster — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 07:00:03 +0000

We can’t believe it, but a year has passed since the last Blog Action Day. Last year, we participated for the first time.

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The theme was world poverty. We did a show about how two sets of farmers worked together. One group was in Ohio and the other was in Kenya. Together they had raised the standard of living for over 5,000 people.

This year’s theme is climate change. Now we’re aware that some of you may be groaning right now. You don’t think that temperatures are getting warmer or more extreme. Even if they are, you think it’s something beyond our actions as humans.

Now others may be groaning because of the first group groaning. It doesn’t matter either way.

We think we can all agree that we should be good stewards of the resources we’re fortunate enough to have.

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My dad was definitely a conservative and a conservationist. He treasured our natural resources. He hated waste … of any kind. He was a contractor who made use of every scrap of every building material.

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That’s our point today – you don’t have to try to save the world to save the world. You can take just one small step that leads to a giant leap for mankind.

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One small step on the moon

We recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Apollo moonwalk. Of course, we all remember the famous words uttered by Neil Armstrong as he became the first person to step on the moon: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

Embedded in those amazing words is a nugget of incredible wisdom. It’s how you change the world … one small step can lead to a giant leap.

The world. Your corner of it. You change one small step at a time.

One small step leads to 34% more

Imagine a trash can. It’s sitting all by itself. People come up to it and throw things away. Only some of those things are recyclable.

So next to the first trash can, imagine an identical can with a lid – a lid with a six-inch hole cut in it.

You see, according to Sean Duffy, an assistant professor of psychology at Rutgers University – Camden, we’ve come to think that a trash can with a hole in the lid means it’s for recyclables.

This simple step – setting a recyclable can right next to a regular trash can – increased recycling of bottles and cans by 34% [PDF] in a month long study he conducted on his campus.

To help you understand how huge that number is, researchers consider a behavioral change of 4 to 5 percent significant. So 34 percent is a giant leap!

If we all just make one small step like the one we described here, it can lead to a giant leap in conservation. Getting the most out of what we’ve been given … sounds like bigg success!

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Thanks so much for reading our post today. You really changed the climate for us!

Please join us next time when we’ll discuss how to keep ripples in your schedule from creating tidal waves in your life. Until then, here’s to your bigg success!

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Plant the Seed This Spring for Your Bigg Success

George Krueger & Mary-Lynn Foster — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 06:16:13 +0000

It’s the first day of spring! Before long, farmers will be planting. That got us thinking – just like a farmer, we have to plant in order to harvest.

If we want an output, we need an input. To produce a result, we have to take action. We can’t control the result, but we can control our activity.

So focus on planting, not the plant!

3 steps to planting the seed
We’re going to work backwards from the final input to the initial activity.

#3 – Plant
Unless you actually plant the seed, you won’t have anything to harvest. You have to follow through on everything that led to this step. Focus on activities that will yield the best result.

#2 – Prepare to plant
To be ready to plant, gather the needed resources together. For the farmer, that means buying the seed, getting the fertilizer, and preparing the ground for planting.

For the rest of us, it depends on your situation. You may need to do some research, prepare collateral materials (e.g. resume, business plan), make a prospect list, find potential strategic partners, or design promotional material.

These are just a few of examples. Preparing takes time and effort, but you have to do it or you won’t be ready for Step 3.

#1 – Plan to plant
If a farmer waits until the first day of spring to start planning for the upcoming season, he’ll have an uphill battle. That’s the reason we counted backwards (in addition to showing you that we could)!

Think who, what, when, and where. And make sure you know the “why” for each of those! And also think about “what if”.

So thinking like a farmer: Who’s going to plant what crop? Where and when will it be planted?

For those of us who don’t farm, think back to Step 2 for an example. We said you may have to do some research. Are you going to do it yourself? Could you pay to have it done? In either case, what research do you need? Where will you find it (or the person who will do it)? When will the research need to be done?

A Bigg Success story
We crank out five shows / blogs and a newsletter every week. That’s our end result. As long as we focused only on the result, we struggled. Then we put into practice what we’re preaching here!

First, we plan our work. We now use a production schedule that maps out what needs to be accomplished every DAY, not every WEEK. That’s made a huge difference.

Second, we prepare every day. What will we talk / write about? Do we have the information or do we need to get it? Where will we get it? Then we gather the required materials. Now we’re ready for the final step.

Third, we do it. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be reading this blog!