In professional meetings and personal conversations I hear a phrase used repeatedly.  As someone is talking about something different than what is currently being done this excuse as I call it seems to continually permeate.  “Well, we could (fill in the blank), but it would be really hard”.

Wait, what?  Something being hard is a reason not to do it?

I remember a movie I watched in high school called, “Road Trip”.  During this movie a group of friends were traveling from New York to Texas.  Along the way one of the guys tells the others that he knows of a short cut to help them through a certain area.  As they go down this short cut they experience resistance and find the path is a lot harder to navigate than the main road.  As one of the characters is complaining about the difficulty they are experiencing the one that suggested the route speaks up and says, “Of course it’s hard.  If it were easy it would be called The Way.”

I haven’t seen this movie in probably 12 or more years but that quote has stuck with me.

I believe most decisions are reached by just doing what has always been done, or what is easiest.  I also believe that anything worthwhile is probably going to be difficult.

We live in a world where people want to lose weight by taking a pill or drinking a magic concoction.  Science tells us over and over again that the best way to lose weight and keep it off is to put in the time and effort to work it off.  We don’t want to though, because it’s hard.

Organizations want better results but don’t want to make the tough decisions to work hard and change their current system.  What we need to understand is that your current system or way of life is perfectly created to get you the results you are currently getting.  It would be insane to think anything could ever be better without hard work and change.

I’ve committed in my personal life that something being hard can never be a consideration that weighs my decision to not do something.  I will also do my best to fight against “hard” being a reason to not do something in any professional associations I have.

What would it look like if we accepted that great=hard?  What would it look like to eliminate the consideration of “hard” from our decisions and focus simply on what needs to be done to be better or great?