ELKHART, Ind. – Speaking to an audience of about 150 people Monday night at Ranger Distribution Inc.’s (RDI) impressive facilities in Elkhart, Ind., Dave Anderson challenged everyone to make their beds every morning. To get plenty of sleep the night before. To stay hydrated. To not leave dirty dishes in the sink.
Anderson is a leading international speaker and prolific author on personal and professional performance improvement and the message behind his challenge was this: How you do anything is how you do everything.
In other words, if you make it a habit to do the little things right, then you’re well prepared when it comes time to do the big things right.
“What you’re doing is you’re conditioning your mind to have a higher standard, to follow a process, to not cut a corner, to not do less than your best, to not make an excuse for doing less than your best,” he said. “Then you bring that well-trained mind into the workplace with you, and it’s already at a high point. You’re already expecting more from you. It’s already disciplined. You already feel good about yourself. So, when we can start to get those little things right, we condition ourselves to where, when we’re in a big arena where the stakes are higher, that we’re already all about excellence.”
This was the second year in a row Anderson spoke at Ranger Distribution (RDI) for the company’s third annual “Giving Without Expectation” speaker series, and his pull-no-punches message of personal accountability seemed to resonate with RDI employees and invited colleagues and partners from the RV industry.
“Well, I think the biggest thing that he likes to talk about as the ‘red belt mentality,’ so those who are hungry will work hard and do the extra things that aren’t necessarily expected of them, but are necessary to get the job done,” said RDI Chief Revenue Officer Brent Diver. “And if you can create a culture that is full of red belts, then as a group or an entity, you’ll excel.
“Our mission is to create a bunch of red belts within our organization,” Diver continued. “Culture is the most important thing to us – and has been since Day One – and we feel like we’ve been very successful in bringing forward the culture of positivity, the culture of accountability, and the red belt culture where we just continue to grind and achieve and outperform the market and enjoy the success that the others around us also enjoy.”
Diver, CEO John Curran and COO Rod Humphreys founded RDI in 2019. It was the three of them, two other employees, one truck and a 22,000-square-foot building. Fast forward to now, and RDI has 30 employees, five trucks and about 100,000 square feet under roof.
Humphreys recalled an early meeting when the group was working on the company’s formation. They were asked what they wanted RDI to be known for, and Humpreys said it took him a “millionth of a second” to come up with an answer.
“I want to walk into the bar to get a beer, have my employee sitting in there and have them look at us and be like, ‘I work at that company. It’s the best company in Elkhart to work at.’ That’s what I want. That’s what I want this company to be,” Humphreys explained.
While they didn’t want this article to appear as if RDI was perfect, they said it is their steadfast intention to continue to cultivate a workplace that will reflect Humphrey’s sentiment – which is why they brought in Anderson to deliver his motivational message.
“The theme of the night is ‘Giving Without Expectation’ and that’s what it is,” said Curran. “This is our thank you to our employees and everybody we do business with, whether it’s on the vendor side, whether it’s on the customer side. Thank you. Thank you for what you do. If we can make our employees successful, if we can make our vendors successful, if we can make our customers successful, then of course RDI is going to be successful.”
Motivational Message
The author of 16 books, most recently “Elevate Your Excellence: The Power of Dong Ordinary Things Extraordinarily Well” and host of the wildly popular podcast, “The Game Changer Life,” Anderson’s hour-long presentation was both a challenge and a reminder that the power to improve lies within ourselves.
Everyone belongs to one of four categories, he explained.
There are Undertakers, who are either have a negative attitude – “They’ve quit but they haven’t left.” – or are prima donnas who think the rules don’t apply to them. Either way, Anderson said, they are a toxin to others. The second group are the Caretakers, who only do just enough to get by. These people are capable of so much more, but they choose not to put forth the effort.
Playmakers are the third group, and they have above-average drive and show flashes of brilliance, but they lack the consistency – and the inner drive to fuel that consistency – of the fourth group, which are the Game-Changers.
“Game-changers go all in every day,” Anderson said. “That doesn’t mean every day’s a great day or, if I’m an athlete, it doesn’t mean every game’s a great game, but it’s not due to the lack of me more consistently bringing eight key traits to the table. I bring more effort, more energy, more enthusiasm, more excellence, more passion, better attitude, more focus and more integrity consistently day in and day out.”
“I’m more consistently bringing those things to the table,” he continued. “That doesn’t mean it always converts to results right away, but I trust the process. I keep bringing it, I keep bringing it, and I start to see results – not always overnight, but certainly over time. Listen, I may not be as talented as the next guy. I may not know the right people, but I’ll outwork them. I’m hungrier than they are.”
Everyone belongs to one of these groups, and people typically will move from one group to another quite often depending on the day, the topic at hand or the stimulus affecting the mindset.
The key to moving into the Game-0changer category, he added, is to discover your “why”.
“The ‘why’ is what motivates you,” Anderson said. “Your ‘why’ is different than mine. There’s not a right ‘why’. There’s not a wrong ‘why’. And your ‘why’ will change throughout your life. Your ‘why’ answers these two questions: Why do I get up in the morning and why should anybody else even care?
“And if those reasons aren’t clear, if they’re not compelling, if they don’t make you do something today you wouldn’t do without it, you’re probably complacent and you might be successful, but you’re never going to be all you could possibly be,” he said.
The RVBusiness Featured Video is sponsored by Curt, a Lippert Brand.
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