Act Well They Part

“Where e’er thou art, act well thy part.”

This timeless mantra, often linked to David O. McKay, isn’t just about doing your job, it’s about doing it well, wherever you are, whatever the assignment. Whether you’re on a stage, on a job site, or sitting at your kitchen table sorting bills, how you show up matters.

When I think of this idea, I think of my brother Dan.

When he was about 12, he had an every day paper route. Sundays were brutal with heavy papers and early hours. One house on the route had a vicious dog. You had to walk into the dog’s chain radius to get the paper on the porch. One morning, I was helping him. The dog growled low and showed its teeth. Dan walked up anyway because the job was to deliver the paper to the porch. As we walked away, the dog lunged and bit Dan in the back of the thigh. He just muttered through clenched teeth, “He bit me,” and kept walking. Bloody leg and all.

Then we were teenagers, we were thrown into a church dance festival. Not exactly our scene.. Dan locked in. He wasn’t naturally gifted at dancing, but he worked on it for hours. He learned the routine cold, step by step, spin by spin. And. Not only did he perform it, but he remembered the choreography for years.

Fast forward many years. Dan’s still that guy. Respected career. Awesome family. Loyal friend. I guarantee if you asked his colleagues, they’d say, “Dan always delivers.”

There’s a quote:

“How you do anything is how you do everything.”

That kind of integrity matters in life. And it really matters in business. You don’t need to be perfect. But you do need to be dependable. Be the one who does the hard thing when it’s inconvenient. Get out of bed when you’d rather stay under the covers. Follow through when no one’s watching.

If that’s not who we’ve been, we can decide to become that person now.