Commitment and Drive: The Difference They Make

Commitment is one of those words that can mean different things to different people. For some, it is about sticking with something when it gets difficult. For others, it is about doing what you said you would do, even when nobody is watching. I think it is probably a bit of both, as well as never giving up and seeing things through to the end.

The word commitment in the wordle above is surrounded by words like dedication, responsibility, loyalty, respect, teamwork, communication, leadership and success. What I like about that is that commitment doesn't really stand on its own. It shows up in how we work with other people and how seriously we take the things we have said we will do.

Drive is slightly different. Drive is what gets you moving in the first place. It is the thing that makes you want to improve, achieve something, learn something new or simply do a good job. But drive without commitment can be short-lived. You can be full of enthusiasm at the beginning of something when its new, but commitment is what keeps you going when the initial excitement has worn off and you have to do the admin for instance to drive the project home.

People like this don't necessarily make the most noise. They aren't always the person talking about how ambitious they are. You just notice that they turn up, they care, and they follow things through. The quiet but reliable ones. If they say they will do something, you generally don't need to chase them - something so rare! But this creates trust.

And trust is important whether we are talking about colleagues, customers, leaders or the people we work with every day. You know where you stand with someone who is committed. You know that they care about the outcome and that they aren't going to disappear when things become a little more difficult.

In customer experience, I think this matters enormously. Customers can tell when someone genuinely wants to help them and when they are simply going through the motions. The words might be exactly the same, but the feeling behind them is different.

Commitment doesn't mean saying yes to everything. Sometimes the right thing is to explain that something can't be done but there is another option, or that it will take longer than expected. What matters is taking ownership of it and seeing it through. That is where drive and commitment come together. You need the drive to want to make things better, but you also need the commitment to keep working at it. Customer experience is rarely improved by one big idea. More often, it is the result of lots of people caring about the small things, day after day.

The same is true of a team: a committed team doesn't mean everyone agrees all the time. In fact, good teams will challenge each other. They will have different opinions and different ways of doing things. But there is a shared sense that everyone wants the same thing to succeed and respects the need to work as a team.

That is where words like teamwork, communication and respect in the wordle become important. Commitment isn't just about personal ambition. It is also about recognising that what we do affects the people around us.

Sometimes drive is about wanting to get somewhere. Commitment is about being prepared to stay on the journey. I think that is why the two work so well together. You need people who care enough to push things forward, but also people who care enough to keep going when things don't go according to plan to see a project through until the end.

Because most worthwhile things take longer than we expect. Most goals have a few setbacks along the way. And most individuals and teams will have difficult days. That doesn't mean the commitment has gone. For me, that is what the word commitment really represents. Not perfection, and not constantly working harder. It is caring about what you do, caring about the people around you, and having enough drive to keep trying to make things better.

That is something customers notice and so do the people you work with.