Survival in good, bad, and ugly times: attaining personal and professional excellence

Purpose – This article aims to present the findings from data gathered from 1,160 individuals who participated over the course of five years in a series of workshops, university courses and business dialogue sessions on the subject of personal and professional excellence. Design/methodology/approach – Data were gathered from dialogue sessions and workshops with LA‐based workforce members, and classroom sessions in higher business education. The shift from general management teaching to focused self‐management dialogues was explained, emerged themes from five years of data gathering were examined and the themes and keywords were visualized and results noted. Findings – The paper finds that in today's rapidly changing world of work, people are seeking ways to reinvent themselves in order to become more resilient. The findings listed in this paper are not exhaustive but should rather be used as a pragmatic tool for further research on the topic. Research limitations/implications – The population used for data was large, yet geographically limited, as it consisted of members of the Los Angeles workforce and business and management students in Los Angeles. The themes to be formed could have been named differently, as the clustering process was done by the author and not the audience. It is suggested that future research should concentrate on applying this study among other geographical and cultural audiences for a greater foundation in findings and for capturing additional, possibly deviating, perspectives. Practical implications – Four main themes are presented as a result of the analysis of the collected data: right action, right thinking, right mindfulness, and right connection, along with 20 keywords. Personal and professional excellence is not a one‐time achievement, but a continuous effort in which multiple aspects need to be addressed at the same time. It could be seen as an ongoing paradigm renewal. Originality/value – The paper tailors a model for personal and professional excellence in the twenty‐first century AD to a model that was developed in the twenty‐fifth century BC.