Who Are The Best People for Great Diligence ?

Purposeful, determined when faced with obstacles, discouragement or opposition

I worked with some great diligence and diligent professionals. They were able to politely but firmly seek information, ask questions and follow up on open items. If they had to email and call you every day to get something done they did it. No stone was left unturned. They were polite but firm, they asked questions, they didn’t take short cuts and they weren’t distractible.

These persistent people were passionate advocates on behalf of their cause, project and goals. Diligence projects can be a maze of issues, loose ends and contradictions. Persistent, consistent action is often needed to overcome obstacles, disappointment, and resistance.

Persistent action helps overcome challenges and lead to diligence success.

Focused, involved, attentive, connected, absorbed in the pursuit of a goal

Diligence benefits from attention to detail and interest is what allows people to focus on the details.

Consider your mindset, actions and the results when you are interested in something. You direct your attention to it, you find the time to do the work, you “attack” it pushing past obstacles; you look for solutions.

Unless you are recruiting for a subject matter expert, the interest level is an interest in the processes that makes diligence successful, especially research and analysis. Interested people are adept and learning what they need.

Interest is the fuel pushing people to keep going through confusion, boredom and tedium, it provides the focus needed to complete the tasks.

Analytic, reasoned, thinking used for issues spotting and problem solving

Every diligence project needs critical thinking. Each team member should be a critical thinker, it is especially necessary now that it is becoming harder to discern the real from the fake and fact from fiction.

Critical thinking means the ability to see not just what is obvious but what may be hidden and to ask questions. Why is it this way, what does this mean, what is missing? These are the questions of a critical thinker. Critical thinkers find, refine and abstract knowledge by examining, investing and probing and they use that knowledge not to block or delay but to problem solve.

Critical thinking is required for achieving clarity and the perspective that allows for conclusions and solutions.

Informed, intellectually curious, open minded, ready to learn, ready to share

People who are knowledgeable don’t know everything instead they are open to learning.

The amount of information that is available, the volume of information that is being created every day, the speed of innovation, invention, creation is so enormous that no one can know everything that is relevant to a diligence topic or specific project.

It is more important to recognize what they don’t know and have the curiosity and drive to find what they need. Knowledgeable people understand the obligation to keep an open mind and the value of evidence. Knowledgeable people share. Share what they know, what they find and share if they don’t know something.

Diligence is only possible if people are open to learning; the process of diligence is a process of acquiring knowledge.

Creative, imaginative, unconventional, collaborative

Innovative thinking is a diligence advantage.

The ability to think creatively, see a problem a different way, pursue a novel approach, provide a new perspective is crucial for the future.

Nothing stays the same, good or bad, and diligence is not an exception. You anticipate change by including innovative people on the team. Not everyone is going to bring the same level of creativity and imagination to the team, but that is fine because if encouraged, creativity can be contagious.

Innovative thinking, technology, strategy, process and education is what differentiates good diligence from great diligence.

Enthusiastic, lively, willing, excited for new challenges

Diligence takes energy. Energy of thought and action. You can’t persevere, think critically or innovate if you don’t have the energy and enthusiasm to do so. Mindset counts.

If you are unsure of this concept think of an example where you did something energetically versus something you did in an indifferent or lazy way. Was the quality the same, the effort, was the outcome the same? Energy doesn’t guarantee success but it does sustain motivation and forward motion.

Energetic thought and action is contagious so encourage and nurture the energetic mindset of your people.