Elevate... from Good to Great

Join Dr. Jackson as he seeks to apply his one-word to his personal and professional life through reflecting through the lens of a seminal book in the field of education.

New Year's Resolutions have been around for a while. Over 4,000 years in fact. According to History.com, the Babylonians were the first to make resolutions as they planted their crops, launching a new year.  I have no idea how well the Babylonians did with sticking to their resolutions 4,000 years ago, but in modern history at least, it seems that resolutions are discarded and forgotten often before the calendar turns from January to February. Resolutions are lost much quicker than the weight loss that seems to be the focus of many a January First Proclamation of Intention.

In this moment, I choose the same word as my #OneWord2023. My one word for 2023 is elevate.

The next step is to begin consideration of the application of my one word. Early on in my one-word journey, I was content to simply reflect on my one word and then commit to continuing to reflect on it as the year went along. I am confident that I did not get the benefit from my one word that I might have. In recent years, I have really made an effort to move from being content to just hanging out in the adoption phase to purposefully and meaningfully moving into an implementation phase. 

This brings me to 2023 and my selection of elevate as my one word. How do I elevate my work? How do I elevate our profession? How do I elevate kindness? On a recent run, I found myself pondering this question and found myself reminiscing back to a book I read many years ago, a book first published in 2001. In this Information Age, with writers suggesting that human knowledge is doubling every two years, what could a 22-year-old book possibly have to teach me or anyone else about elevating my work in 2023? Depending on the book, perhaps quite a bit. I’ll let you judge for yourself the timeliness and timelessness of the book’s lessons.

The book I am referring to is the book titled, “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap …and Others Don’t” by Jim Collins. For me, it is a touchstone text that continues to pop up in random discussions because of the power of the lessons.

Perhaps one of the greatest takeaways from the book and one of the most repeated phrases that I have heard from others is Collins’ assertion that good is the enemy of great. He surmised that few people manage to achieve greatness in their lives as they settle too quickly for a comfortable life. We can probably all name an Edleader who seemed destined for greatness, on the fast track to ever-increasing responsibilities, who just seemed to fizzle out, or who reached a particular level and never moved beyond it. If we are not careful and if we do not actively seek continuous improvement, we stagnate.