Tenacity

Tenacity is the quality of being determined and persistent. I have found tenacity to be a key factor in long-term success.

My father grew up during the Great Depression. His father had died when he was young, and he was raised by his single mother, grandmother and sister. Jobs were hard to find but, like most people at this time, my father was desperate to find employment.

My father told me that he would visit the local deli every day and ask the owner for a job. Finally, after weeks of daily visits, the owner gave in and gave my father a job. My father worked hard and eventually own his own meat business (but that is another story).

When James Dyson invented his first Dual Cyclone vacuum cleaner, he spent 15 years creating 5,126 versions that failed before he made one that worked. The payoff was a multibillion-dollar company known for its creativity and forward-thinking designs. That persistence is tenacity.

Tenacity is a willingness to fail. Fail over and over again. Learn from your failure and improve. Never giving up until you achieve your goal. It is not easy but necessary if you want to do great things.

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Goodman, Nadia. James Dyson on Using Failure to Drive Success. Entrepreneur. November 5, 2012. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/224855