{"id":5962,"date":"2026-04-09T13:41:22","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T11:41:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/excellence-makes-you-lonely\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T13:11:05","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T11:11:05","slug":"excellence-makes-you-lonely","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/excellence-makes-you-lonely\/","title":{"rendered":"Excellence makes you lonely"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">When performance irritates<\/h2>\n\n<p>In a Western world that has organized stability and prosperity for years, excellence has become a foreign concept. It lives in social exile. <\/p>\n\n<p>Mediocrity stabilizes itself. And it leads to below-average performance. Its supporters benefit from a system that enables them to live a decent life with moderate performance.  <\/p>\n\n<p>The idea of leading one&#8217;s own talents to a top individual level through sacrifice and great effort is not particularly attractive today. It seems excessive, sometimes even antisocial. <\/p>\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Excellence disturbs<\/h3>\n\n<p>Not because it is wrong, but because it makes differences visible.<\/p>\n\n<p>This is where we stand as a society and therefore also as a business location.<br\/>With infinite wealth, this would not be a problem. But even the printing press and quantitative easing only postpone the point in time of a conflict of realities: declining efficiency with a simultaneous claim to prosperity. <\/p>\n\n<p>Top performance has therefore not disappeared. It has just receded. <\/p>\n\n<p>It continues to exist in areas such as art, sport and business.<br\/>It is visible where it is not constantly relativized.<\/p>\n\n<p>A different logic is evident in the wider economy: organizations optimize for stability and not for excellence.  <\/p>\n\n<p>The focus on safeguarding is increasing: processes, committees, responsibilities and language are being aligned accordingly. Much of this makes sense.<br\/>The result is a system that reduces friction. <\/p>\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The normalization of mediocrity<\/h3>\n\n<p>Excellence creates friction. And that is precisely why it is reduced. <\/p>\n\n<p>Not openly, but structurally: through priorities, through evaluation systems, through what is considered &#8220;appropriate&#8221;. This is how the benchmark shifts. Not abruptly, but gradually.  <\/p>\n\n<p>The promotion of top talent and the development of real skills are taking a back seat.<br\/>Social and media acceptance are moving to the forefront.<\/p>\n\n<p>This is stable in the short term, but risky in the long term.<\/p>\n\n<p>As a result, competitiveness is declining. This trend is already visible in Germany and will take time to be corrected. <\/p>\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Provocation trumps inspiration<\/h3>\n\n<p>An attitude that demands excellence does not automatically lead to integration. On the contrary: it creates resistance. <\/p>\n\n<p>That is understandable: Excellence challenges existing standards.<\/p>\n\n<p>And that is why it is withdrawing. From organizations, from public debates, from visibility. <\/p>\n\n<p>It loses one of its most important functions: to inspire others.<\/p>\n\n<p>Excellence makes you lonely. Not because it isolates, but because it makes differences visible. <\/p>\n\n<p>I wish it were different.<br\/>It doesn&#8217;t change the findings.<\/p>\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a Western world that has organized stability and prosperity for years, excellence has become a foreign concept. It lives in social exile. Mediocrity stabilizes itself. And it leads to below-average performance.     <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4019,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-unkategorisiert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5962"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5963,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5962\/revisions\/5963"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2helmets.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}