Jim Collins is a former Stanford Business School professor and the author of four best-selling books about great companies. From an interview in Inc magazine, here’s his take on what makes a company great:
To be great, a company also has to make a distinctive impact. I define that by a test: If your company disappeared, would it leave a gaping hole that could not easily be filled by any other enterprise on the planet? Now, that doesn't mean the company has to be big. A restaurant could have such great relationships with customers—such a great community presence and such great food—that, if it went away, people would feel a gaping hole, and no one could easily come in and fill it."
That’s actually a good test for all of us, whether or not we own a business. If you stopped showing up to play baseball or write for the school newspaper, to counsel kids or teach English, to run PTA meetings or chair the parent fundraising committee, would you leave a gaping hole that would be hard to replace?
I tell a story at Collegewise about one of our students who admitted he was the worst water polo player on his high school team. But he loved the game and brought so much energy and spirit to practice with him every day that he won the coach’s award two years in a row (even though he’d played less than five minutes of actual game time). He wrote his college essay about water polo and got into every college he applied to. Like the great companies, he would have been missed if he had stopped showing up, and he could not have been easily replaced.
You don’t necessarily need the highest GPA, best curveball, most clients, etc. to be great. You just need to make yourself hard to replace.