# Chapter 195

Pursue excellence not acceptance. Another Lincolnism. This is about a posture of learning at its core. All great leaders are voracious learners. Great leaders spend all their energy learning and learning how to learn, not posturing and worrying about how they look. In most folks, their capacity learn determines their future success. Instead of being concerned about their looks, their social media, their “likes”, their status in the world’s eyes, they are working hard at doing what they do with excellence. In fact they may not notice whether they are accepted or not, whether they are popular or not. Fame and recognition are not nearly as important as doing a job well. In a world of Facebook, TikTok, snapchat and instagram where recognition and how many followers or friends you have feels so important, leaders aren’t even paying attention to these matters. They are all in on making a difference and doing it well. They are going big on learning all that they can and then owning the field, the company, the competition, whatever.

This top tier leader is often oblivious to the snobbish cultural cues that others around her or him are ultra sensitive to. Heck I had to point out to one of my clients all the causalities they were leaving behind in their relational wake! She just wasn’t really aware because she was so focused on learning and satisfying her curiosity. She was full on in the pursuit of excellence, and those that couldn’t keep up simply got left behind, figuratively and literally. Yet learning is essentially a humble position, and great leaders are humble toward fellow learners.