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Success Really Isn’t About Money…

This morning I had a meeting with several professional Scouts. These people make their livings serving the Boy Scouts of America. They are not likely to become wealthy in the conventional sense. Their jobs involve long hours and they all serve well above and beyond the normal parameters of their job descriptions.

Steve Saucier is the District Executive, a professional position. I met Steve when he recruited me to serve as the District Chairman, a volunteer position. From our very first meeting I knew I was involved with something special. In my youth I was a Scout who was interested more in camping than merit badges; Steve had his work cut out for him bringing me up-to-date on today’s version of the Scouts.

He talked about how proud he was to be involved in Scouting. He talked about the difference Scouting makes in the lives of young people. He talked about how important it is to teach and preserve the core values of Scouting and how these values would help shape the future. He talked about the high-quality of the people involved in Scouting, both professional and volunteer.

He clearly described the current state of the District, his goals for the future and his success so far in reaching past goals. He said his primary goal was that when he moved on to another position, he would leave the District just a little better than he found it.

He did not talk about money.

Is Steve a success story? I don’t know exactly how much Steve makes. I do know that given his credentials he could make a lot more money in private industry. Steve and his colleagues measure their success by the power they’re sharing in the lives of young people.

There’s nothing wrong with using money as one measurement of success; in certain endeavors that’s perfectly appropriate. But how do you quantify changing a generation of young people? The opportunity Steve and his colleagues provide for young people may play a part in the development of many future leaders, some of them are likely to shape the world. Any attempt to assign a dollar value to that work makes no sense.

Money is certainly easy to measure and quantify. Your impact in the lives of others may never be fully appreciated, at least not in your life time. When you measure success in emotional and spiritual terms, you’ve got to rely on what many people would consider “intangible” areas.

In reality, what is more tangible? A huge amount of material resources can evaporate in an instant, and sometimes through no fault of your own. The part you play in the life of someone else may not be as easy to measure, you may have to rely on feeling, but that resource can never be diminished. The power generated in service of others only increases with time.

Ultimately, your success is entirely up to you. Not only in the doing, but it’s also up to you to declare when and how any success is realized. You shape your goals, and it’s up to you to declare victory. The more you can shape goals where success is realized, the greater your feeling of satisfaction, self-worth and independence. These feelings are, in and of themselves, real and lasting measurements of success!

It is a privilege to be working with people who measure their success completely by the potential impact they have in the lives of our future generations; an impact they may never be able to fully measure. Our culture is struggling to regain some sense of core values. In this enterprise, Steve and the Boy Scouts are examples of true success.

Want to find out more about today's Scouts? Visit: www.Scouting.org!

Jim Bouchard is the author of Dynamic Components of Personal Power. Find out more about Jim and Dynamic Components at www.JimBouchard.org!

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