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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, I hate shopping at WalMart, and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living. In today’s episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday I share a lesson learned by working hard.
If you’re looking to get caught up on Falling Skies before the season 4 premiere on Sunday, we’ve got you covered. Earlier this week I recorded a Falling Skies recap episode with Emilee O’Leary, my co-host for Berserker Cast. You can find Berserker Cast in iTunes, Stitcher, or our website. Season 4 looks like it should be filled with lots of great action and alien butt kicking. I hope you’ll join the fun with us. We’ll also be launching our Under the Dome podcast, Chester’s Mill Gazette, and our Arrow podcast, Arrow Squad, within the next few days.
Friday Forum
Friday Forum is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can participate in Friday Forum by visiting our Feedback Page.
What I Learned Yesterday:
Remember way back in episode 3 when I told you about my proudest moment? That was the episode where I lost all of my friends because of my arrogance. That was a really hard but very important lesson for me to learn. I’m sorry that I had to learn it the hard way, but I’m glad I learned it at such a young age. Today I want to tell you another story about that time of my life. In fact, today’s story helped lead up to the lesson I learned in episode 3.
So there I was, 19 or 20 years old, working part time at the bookstore, and really enjoying it. I was looking for an opportunity to take on more responsibility. I knew that the best way to be given more responsibility was to do a good job with the responsibilities that I already had. Whether it was sweeping the floor, taking out the trash, putting up merchandise, or working the cash register, my goal was to do them all to the best of my ability.
My hard work paid off. One day an opportunity opened up as the department head of Bibles and church supplies. The store had quite a few Bibles, several hundred different types including over 20 english language translations, nearly a dozen foreign language translation, and a multitude of styles within each translation. There were dozens of study Bibles, that is Bibles that had notes included to help give insight to the reader, reference Bibles that specialize in cross-referencing various Bible verses, Children’s Bibles, Bibles for teens, women, men, married couples, and pastors.
In addition to the regular paper Bibles, there were protective cases to put Bibles into, highlighters and note taking supplies, and Bible software.
The church supplies section included things like postcards that churches could use for various reasons, paper to use for announcements and note taking during church services, offering plates, communion supplies, witnessing literature, and record keeping supplies.
I knew nearly nothing about all the various items. I knew a little bit about a few of the Bibles, and knew some of the uses of some of the church supplies, but I knew I didn’t know nearly enough to be able to answer the variety of questions I’d need to know in order to properly assist customers. Still, it was a promotion and a position I wanted, so I put my name in for it and I got it.
I wasn’t content with simply landing the promotion. I wanted to to the best with my new responsibilities. I wanted to make the manager happy about his decision, and I wanted to continue to work up to a higher position within the company.
So I began pouring myself into research to learn about the various Bibles. I found a book that explained the history of how the Bible came to contain the 66 books of the old and new testaments. I also read books about the various translations and what made each of them unique. I found out which translations were best for different reading levels and uses.
Knowing about the products was only part of my goal. My goal was to know where every single item was in my department. I wanted to be able to instantly take a customer to the exact shelf and shelf location. I was obsessed. I would quiz myself by visualizing the department. I would start at one end and name off every single item one by one until I had committed the entire inventory to memory.
One day we added some new software to our selection. It contained a whole library of resources all on one CD. It came in a variety of options, the cheaper options had fewer titles on them, the more expensive options had more resources on them. The top of the line version sold for $500, and that was our sale price. My boss didn’t think we’d sell any of them at that price. I told him that I could sell one within a certain time period. Maybe it was two weeks, but I think it was a month. He told me that if I sold one, he’d buy me a steak dinner. Challenge accepted.
It just so happened that around that time one of the churches in town was finishing construction on a brand new building. They wanted to outfit it with all brand new candle holders, communion supplies, offering plates, etc. I met with a couple of their church leaders a few times and got it all taken care of. Their order totalled over $3500. That same month I sold not one, but two copies of the $500 software packages.
My manager was quite pleased as you can imagine. He showed up the next day with a gift certificate for a steak dinner. The dinner was delicious and I felt so proud of the hard work and recognition for a job well done.
Here’s what I learned.
Hard work pays off. My dad always told us to work hard and be honest with our work. He demonstrated what hard work looked like, and when we started a job, we didn’t stop until the job was done the right way.
I took that work ethic with me when I entered the workforce and it served me well. When I faced a situation where I saw a deficiency in myself, I gathered resources to help me. Sometimes those resources were books or websites, sometimes those resources were other experts, and sometime those resources were my co-workers. Because I was willing to do the work required to learn my job and perform at a high level, it put me in a great position to get the next promotion.
However, it’s worth remembering that it all started because I was willing to be the best broom pusher, light bulb changer, and trash man that I could be. Through the little things, came bigger things. If I hadn’t done those things first, I never would have made it 19 years and ended up working on projects with the president of the company.
I’m Darrell Darnell and this has been stuff I learned yesterday.
If you’ve enjoyed this episode of Stuff I Learned Yesterday, I would be grateful if you’d leave a review in iTunes.
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