Cutting through the noisy news cycle is tough. Even the announcement of NASA successfully landing a man-made rover on Mars likely escaped your notice. Long story short, the new rover is currently sending videos and 4K photography back to earth, expanding our understanding of the distant planet.

This is an exciting advance for technology and science. But it was the rover’s name that caught my attention.

A seven-grader from Virginia, Alexander Mather, won a nationwide contest to name the planet-hopping machine. His name recommendation? Perseverance. His essay, backing up his nomination, takes less than a minute to read and offers a dose of inspiration.

Reading this short essay prompted my own internal reflection:

What role does perseverance play in my life, work, and team?

As I’m sure is the case for many of you, the past 12 months have taught me that perseverance and its peers are not nice-to-haves. Perseverance – alongside resilience, persistence, and fortitude – are absolute requirements to live in our dynamic, unpredictable world.

Perseverance helps us:

• Outsmart obstacles. Obstacles are a part of life, and they don’t go away by avoiding them.  Face challenges head-on and you’ll be empowered to leap past them.
• Organize a team. By creating cohesion and shared resilience, teams pull together to support the common cause. The impact of sustained focus and effort can be multiplied with the support of a team.
• Overcome the past. Those who practice perseverance see failure as an opportunity to grow, drawing on strength and courage to propel forward. They find this strength and courage internally and remember that failure is just a polite reminder to adjust our strategy.

Just as perseverance can help you – it’s helped our NASA friend on Mars. “Percy” (his nickname) reached his first destination in February. But, as his name teaches us, Percy’s mission is just getting started.

Perseverance is not a long race, but many short ones, one after another.