I had a discussion last week with a coworker about complacency. We were discussing the importance of continual professional improvement. Being complacent is very bad. If I'm not improving, I'm being left behind. But, its also a perception issue. Whether its my employees, my board of directors, or our customers, the perception of complacency can be cancerous.
Shameless self promotion isn't the answer to this, so what is? Perception management gets a little too close to the dark side for my taste. Further, one can't get wrapped up in a litany of self improvement techniques. Neither is it useful to be paralyzed with introspection.
I suspect the key is getting to a place of conscious incompetence. That is, identifying those areas which need improvement and taking a measured and consistent approach to addressing them. Combining this with transparency is good enough for addressing perceptions. At least... I think it is. We'll see.
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