Every team member gets a medal at the end of the season for participating in most youth sports leagues. The medal merely recognizes participation. In real life, adults do not get participation medals. What matters for most organizations, businesses and even families, is impact. Impact goes beyond just participation. Impact means results or at least a strong effect on someone or something that creates a solution or result. In both the adult and business worlds, simply showing up to participate might get you an hourly paycheck but creating a positive impact will get you promoted. MORE THAN SHOWING UP We teach children to participate in life, which includes participation in school activities, clubs, and sports. Most times, just “showing up” is all that is expected to be able to say they are participating. As adults, we also often end up measuring participation. We recount how many meetings or activities we attended. If participation is the standard, then we have set the bar for succ...

  How well do you know your neighbors? Can you name each of the neighbors that adjoin your property or apartment? Do you know a personal fact about each one? Do you speak to your neighbors? Turns out that less than two percent of Americans can say yes to all three of these questions. In the meantime, our culture is becoming angrier and much less forgiving. We are more isolated. Part of the reason is that we have forgotten the art of neighboring. It takes effort. It takes some purposeful planning. Neighboring will also take some time. But it should be a priority and the benefits are plentiful, both personally and for our community. I am not asking that you try to be neighborly to everyone in town. However, what would our towns look like if we all made an effort to be neighborly to the people living next door? Your neighbor may be starved for a friend! On the other hand, your neighbor might have amazing skills or insights to contribute to a neighborhood. Take time to get to know the ...

Do you realize the impact your daily attitude can have on people? Especially in business, a “hi, how is your day” attitude with a smile can go a long   way . Thursday, Aug. 23 was a day like that for me. I have many things in my life to be happy about,   but   there are also stresses. Sometimes stress can get the better of you and drag your attitude down. So I’ll admit, despite beautiful weather and an early morning walk with my dog Otis in the crisp cool air, my attitude was not the best when I started out. But, four people in Republic with great customer focused attitudes helped to brighten my gray day. I had an issue with my car the night before.   Since I thought it was my battery, I went to O’Reilly Automotive in Republic.   Johnny offered to come out and test my car batter – despite the rain that had just begun. He offered an evaluation and some good advice. I love buying local,   but   I like it even more when the person making the sale says, “t...