People who meet him say it's the first thing they notice about him. A
more rigorous
way to say this may be: people who meet him say it's the first thing
they can't not notice about him because it simply
grabs their
attention.
It's the essential quality he brings to every occasion. It's an
extraordinary
quality, to be sure. You recognize it immediately with every fiber of
your being when you experience him for the first time, even though you
may never have experienced this particular human quality before. You
can tell what it is
straight
away even though you may never have known it or seen it before. Clearly
it's a human quality - because it's brought forth by a human being. But
just as clearly, it's uncommon. You get when he
presents
it, that it's uncommon. By "uncommon" I mean "rare". It's so rare in
fact that, for all intents and purposes, he's totally
unique this way.
By bringing forth this quality, he ups the ante for
everyone around him to bring forth the same quality. But listen: it's
not a quality he brings forth only occasionally, like on special
occasions. It's not something he has at stake only sometimes.
Rather it's a quality he always brings forth with everyone
around him - which is to say with everyone he works with, which is to
say with everyone he's in relationship with, which is to say with
everyone - period.
It's the quality which some call ruthless compassion. That's
good. It's actually pretty close to what it is. But for me, although
"ruthless compassion" comes close to what it really is and
may even be a component of what it really is, it doesn't
totally capture it. I'd like to suggest the quality of which we speak
is actually relentless compassion rather than merely
ruthless compassion. Or simply
relentless‑ness. He's relentless - compassionate is a
given.
There's a shift in order of magnitude from ruthless to
relentless. Do you get it? Granted, it's unusual to use the two
words
"relentless" and "compassion" in the same phrase or sentence. But by
"unusual" I mean unusual like
a breakthrough
in being ... and it only proves his thesis of what's possible
for human beings to call his unique
breakthrough
in being, unusual.
Indeed you could call him unusual. You could also call him many other
things. Whatever you call him, he's anything butbusiness as usual.
Yes, you could call him a business man. His products are
unabashedly marketed to businesses and also as businesses,
each of which set the gold standard for
excellence
in delivery, and for superior customer satisfaction. Yet he's anything
but usual.
In relating to people as their strengths and not as their
complaints nor as their considerations nor as their rackets, he's
relentless. In relating to
who people really are
(that's people as everyone - not only people as his
customers) there's no let up. Ever. Not once. No one left out. Not
one exception. Not for one moment.
He's been relentless with people like this
24 / 7 / 365
for the last forty two years, and more. It's uncanny. There are no
signs of him stopping. For most people, keeping this up for one
day let alone
24 / 7 / 365
for forty two years, would be exhausting. For him it's effortless.
Actually for him I suspect it's more than that. For him ... it's ... a
...
demonstration.