Learn. Ceaselessly. Learn to code, to write persuasively, to understand new technologies, to bring out the best in your team, to find underused resources and to spot patterns.

Sometimes, we're so focused on being consistent that we also lower the bar on amazing. After all, the thinking goes, if we can't be amazing all the time, better to reset the expectation to merely good. Which robs us of the ability to (sometimes) be amazing.

If we can fall in love with serving people, creating value, solving problems, building valuable connections and doing work that matters, it makes it far more likely we're going to do important work

How often do our heroes stand still? It's hard to imagine Spock and Kirk landing on a planet and just relaxing for a month or two. Just hanging out has nothing to do with boldly going where no one has gone before. What makes us different from every other creature is that we go places, places we've not gone before. We do it willingly, and often. What makes our work and our life interesting is discovery, surprise, and the risk of exploration.

The goal, then, isn't to draw some positioning charts and announce that you have differentiated your product. No, the opportunity is to actually create something that people choose to talk about, regardless of what the competition is doing.

The future of marketing is leadership

If you've got the platform and the ability to make a difference, then this goes beyond 'should' and reaches the level of 'must.' You must make a difference or you squander the opportunity. Wasting the opportunity both degrades your own ability to contribute and, more urgently, takes something away from the rest of us.