Dependability: How Dependable Am I?

Dependability is extremely important. Countless people--including our clients, real estate professionals, co-workers, and even our families and friends--depend on us every day. How we rise to the challenge of not letting down those people in our lives who are important to us, is what separates us from the crowd.

As you might guess, Dependability is vastly important in our specific line of work as property inspection service providers. Customers have to be able to depend on us and we aim to exceed their expectations in this area every day. In fact, Dependability is one of our core values, and is part of our Human Qualities Program. So I thought I'd share an excerpt from our Dependability training module. The topic is, how we can show dependability at work, and it's a self-assessment exercise that we have found very useful.

How Dependable Am I?
A Self-Assessment

Dependability is a key component of work performance. In fact, often "good quality work" will not be enough to make up for a lack of dependability.  Dependability is one of those qualities that is either present or absent. You cannot be "partially dependable" or even "mostly dependable." To be dependable means to be consistent, regardless of the amount of extra effort it takes.

Assess your dependability at work. For each of the questions consider: Who did my behavior impact? How can I consistently continue this positive behavior? Or how can I change this negative behavior?

1. Name three times recently when you went out of your way to demonstrate  dependability.  (These can be small examples. It is the small things that, over time, count the most.)  Who benefited from your efforts and how can you continue this positive behavior?
2. Have there been times in the past three months when you did not deliver as you promised?  (e.g., you missed a deadline, you were late, you failed to follow through, etc.)  Who did your behavior impact and how can you do better in the future?
3. Do you know what your reputation is in the area of dependability? Do others believe they can consistently count on you? Is there anything you can do to assure them that they can consistently count on you?
4. Repeat referrals often correlate to dependability. How many of your referral sources sent you repeat business in the past three months?
5. Have any of your referral sources stopped requesting you? Could this be related to your dependability?
6. Do others seem to have confidence in your ability to deliver?  When someone asks you to complete a task, do they then "let go" and assume that it will be taken care of by you?
7. Producing good quality work with consistency is part of dependability. Prior to distributing your work as "finished", do you take the extra time to make sure that it is truly the best quality for the time available? 

I hope you find this exercise as useful as we do!