What We Can Learn From the Oscars

To be the best in your career, you need to practice your craft. Every year's Academy Awards ceremony is recognition of this. It requires patience, teamwork, creativity ... and, most importantly, hard work.

Set high standards for yourself -- for your behavior, your actions, your work ethic. And then work to live up to those ideals. Lowering the bar is a cop-out. I found this quote (author unknown) that sums up the struggle for those who decide that it's too much work to live up to the ideal that they had once expressed for themselves.

“The greasiest leverage you can create for yourself is the pain that comes from inside, not outside. Knowing that you have failed to live up to your own standards for your life is the ultimate pain. If we fail to act in accordance with our own view of ourselves, if our behaviors are inconsistent with our standards - with the identity we hold for ourselves - then the chasm between our actions and who we are drives us to make a change. One of the strongest forces in the human personality is the drive to preserve the integrity of our own identity.”

You want to be an Oscar-winning actor or director? You must work hard. You can't say, "Well, that's too much trouble."

You want to be the best resume writer there is? You must put in the time. Write a lot of resumes. Work on improving your skills. Take criticism gracefully. And never, ever lower your standards.