A few weeks ago my wife and I watched the movie MS Dhoni - An Untold Story. I found the movie average, but there’s one scene that really stood out for me. (For those who don’t know, MS Dhoni is one of the most successful batsmen and team captains of all time in Indian Cricket)
To give you the context of the scene, Dhoni had taken a huge personal risk of leaving his ticket collector job and going all in on his cricket training. He spends his days and nights practicing patiently.
Finally, one day when he is playing a game of badminton, his friends come by and excitedly tell him that he’s been selected to the India A-Team.
Woo-hoo! The thing that Dhoni has been dreaming about and focusing on his whole life has come true. This is a tremendous achievement for him.
But how does he react?
He doesn’t run to his friends and give them high-fives. He keeps playing.
“Did you hear us? You’ve been selected! Aren’t you excited about this good news? Let’s go celebrate!”
He keeps playing.
After a while, he finally replies to them “Yes, I heard you. I will finish this game and then join you.”
— — — — -
The discipline of finishing
The sign of a world-class performer is someone who finishes what they started. Dhoni had the focus and the discipline of finishing something as small as a game of badminton with a friend. Not even the excitement of his dream coming true would take his focus away from the game he had started. I’m confident the movie directors chose to include this sliver of his life because they saw how this reflected a fundamental trait of his character.
In today’s world of infinite opportunities, too much importance is given to starting new projects, when the skill that’s much more crucial is finishing what you started. That’s not only for formal projects at work — it’s everywhere. Finishing clearing your mail inbox, reading that article, watching that video, writing that article, completing that course or finishing those hobby classes you took up.
Most of us reading this are involved in knowledge work. One way to see your work is every task or project that you start, which is currently a work-in-progress is time & effort that has been invested but is not yet providing value to the customer. (The customer is whoever is affected by your project or task) Once you complete it, the value creation can start. But as an incomplete project, it’s an investment of time that has had zero return and depreciates in value the longer it stays with you.
Look at all the things you are doing currently. How many are currently work-in-progress. Do you have clarity on what project completion looks like for those tasks?
Today, before taking on something new, look at the list of projects that you are currently working on. Which of those can you complete?
