With a new influx of college graduates hitting the job market, I thought it would be a good time to share some advice. I started working when I was just 12 years old, with my first newspaper route, and believe me, these lessons apply to jobs and disciplines across the spectrum.

Success requires hard work, but also the willingness to listen to good advice is a skill that can make or break a career. Why make the same mistakes that people have been making for decades when you can avoid them?

If I had to prioritize, I would say the first thing is to believe in yourself -- even when no one else does. Life is not a parabolic curve. It doesn’t go straight up. There are a lot of lumps and bumps. I’ve never met a successful person who hasn’t had to overcome either a little or a lot of adversity.

Second, there are three things you must know to be successful:

1. Don’t quit.

2. Don’t quit.

3. Don’t quit.

When I graduated from the University of Minnesota a long time ago, I was kind of cocky and thought I knew it all. I thought I’d be able to start at the top and work up. It doesn’t work that way.

I started as an envelope salesman, and they threw me the Yellow Pages (that thick book with phone numbers and addresses that we used pre-internet) and said, “Good luck, kid.” I was having all kinds of problems, and one day I asked an old, grizzly salesman: How long do you call on a prospect before you stop calling? And he said: “It depends on which one of us dies first.”

Similarly, Kemmons Wilson, the founder of Holiday Inn, was asked to give the commencement address at his alma mater -- even though he never graduated. He said, “(Y)ou only have to work half a day, every day, and it doesn’t matter if it’s the first 12 hours or the last 12 hours.”

“There is no I in team” is more than a sports adage. I like to pass along this message, because you cannot do it all by yourself. The boat won’t go if we all don’t row. As Steve Jobs said, “Great things in business are never done by one person. They’re done by a team of people.”

And the most important piece of advice: Act like your mother is watching. Unfortunately, the business community -- of which I am a part -- does not get stellar grades for ethics the past several years. Ethics and integrity must be the cornerstone of your existence. I like to say, if you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters.

Next point: Practice makes perfect -- not true. You have to add one word. Perfect practice makes perfect. Practice something time and time again, and if you don’t know what you’re doing wrong, all you’re really doing is perfecting an error. You’ve put a ceiling on how good you can become. Find a coach or mentor to help you hone your skills.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, American philosopher and poet, said: “All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better.”

Consider these words of wisdom from some of the world’s most successful people:

-- Oprah Winfrey: “You know you are on the road to success if you would do your job and not be paid for it.”

-- Phil Knight, former CEO of Nike: “There is an immutable conflict at work, in life and in business, a constant battle between peace and chaos. Neither can be mastered, but both can be influenced. How you go about that is the key to success.”

-- Henry Ford: “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”

-- Col. Harland Sanders: “I made a resolve then that I was going to amount to something if I could. And no hours, nor amount of labor, nor amount of money would deter me from giving the best that there was in me. And I have done that ever since, and I win by it.”

-- President Theodore Roosevelt: “The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people."

-- Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors: “Do every job you’re in like you’re going to do it for the rest of your life, and demonstrate that ownership of it.”

A new young worker at a construction site sat down to eat his lunch with the rest of the crew. As an older fellow opened his thermos to pour out coffee, the young worker asks, “What’s that?”

The older fellow says, “It’s a thermos bottle.”

“What is it for?” the young worker asks.

“It keeps hot liquids hot and cold liquids cold,” the older fellow said.

The next day the young worker arrives at the construction site with his own thermos.

The older fellow asks, “Whatcha got in your thermos?”

“Two cups of HOT coffee and a glass of COLD iced tea.”

“Communication does not begin with being understood, but with understanding others,” said W. Steven Brown, founder and chairman of the Fortune Group International.

Avoiding misunderstandings is fundamental to a successful workplace, not to mention life in general. Getting along is largely dependent on your communication skills. If doing your job is important, you need to let people know what you’re doing, and you need to understand what they want from you.

Curious though it may seem, good communication starts with listening, not talking. Expressing yourself is vital, but understanding what others are telling you allows you to make your arguments more persuasive.

If you want your views to be respected, you must show equal respect when others express their opinions. Show that you understand their words and ideas, even if you disagree with them. A little empathy goes a long way.

Not only is brevity the soul of wit, it is also a demonstration of respect for others’ time. Going on and on, even when you’re right, turns people off. Learn to make your points clearly and concisely, then let others respond. No one likes to be lectured to.

Watch your tone. So much of two-way communication depends on both sides feeling like they are not in hostile territory. Even when two parties disagree, getting rude and personal is never acceptable. Never. Ever.

Body language often speaks louder than words. Nonverbal communication sends a powerful message. Be aware of your hand gestures, eye contact, stance and tone of voice so you don’t undercut what you’re trying to say. And pay attention to the other party’s cues. Adjust your approach if necessary.

With so much of our communication written rather than spoken in person, don’t ignore the impact of texts, tweets, emails, posts and letters. You would think that because you actually have to take the time to type and transmit, it would be easier to choose your words more carefully. Unfortunately, that is not the case.

Messages committed to print are eternal, it seems, so it pays to read and reread what you are expressing before you hit the send button. How many times have people had to take down a post because it didn’t say what they meant? Can you or your business afford a misunderstanding?

“Words have meaning beyond the obvious. Words have consequences beyond intention,” said John R. Dallas Jr., author of “We Need to Have a Word: Words of Wisdom, Courage and Patience for Work, Home and Everywhere.”

Let that sink in for a minute. A simple combination of letters can change the course of progress. A poorly chosen phrase can end a working relationship -- even if you didn’t mean quite what you said.

In other words, think before you speak.

The Chinese philosopher Confucius is said to have once been asked his views on the importance of good communication in getting things done. “What,” asked the questioner, “is the first thing to be done if good work is to be accomplished?”

Confucius replied, “Getting the definitions right, using the right words.” He elaborated that “when words are improperly applied, issues are misunderstood. When issues are misunderstood, the wrong plans are devised. When the wrong plans are devised, wrong commands are given. When wrong commands are given, the wrong work is performed. When the wrong work is performed, organizations fail. When organizations fail, the people suffer.”

And so he concluded, “The first thing is to achieve the proper naming of things.”

Here's a joke to further illustrate my point:

Two men went into a diner and sat down at the counter. They ordered two sodas, took sandwiches out of their packs and started to eat them. The owner saw what was going on and approached the men.

“You can’t eat your own sandwiches in here,” he complained.

So the two men stopped, looked at each other and then swapped their sandwiches.

Mackay’s Moral: It is wiser to choose what you say than to say what you choose.

A major league batter has approximately two-fifths of a second from the time a baseball leaves the pitcher's hand until it reaches home plate. In that split second, the batter must attempt to gauge speed, trajectory and placement of the pitch.

Those batters who can do it well enough to hit safely three out of 10 at bats become millionaires. Those who are a millisecond slower and can do it only two out of 10 times have to find another way to make a living.

Companies and their employees face similar challenges. They may have a little more time to deal with their problems, but if they expect to stay in the game, they have to be able to make rapid adjustments. Fortunes are made and lost by those who disregard the importance and power of time.

People have been talking about time for centuries. Proof positive is this excerpt from a book titled “Zadig or the Book of Fate,” by the 18th-century philosopher Voltaire: “Of all the things in the world, which is the longest and shortest, the quickest and the slowest, the most divisible and the most extensive, the most disregarded and the most regretted, without which nothing can happen, which devours everything that is little, and gives life everything that is great?

“The answer is time. Nothing is longer, since it is the measure of eternity. Nothing is shorter, since it is lacking in all our plans. Nothing is slower for him who waits. Nothing is quicker for him who enjoys. It extends to the infinitely little. All men disregard it. All men regret the loss of it. Nothing happens without it. It makes forgotten everything unworthy of posterity, and it immortalizes the great things.”

I have a saying that I’ve often used: Killing time isn’t murder; it’s suicide. We all start out in life with one thing in common; we all have the same amount of time each day, each week, each month and each year. Now it’s just a matter of what we do with it.

Questions that I am repeatedly asked are: How can I get everything done with so many interruptions, distractions and shifting responsibilities? What’s the trick to prioritizing? Where’s the balance between work and personal time?

My primary advice is to first get organized -- really, really organized. I don’t mean just tidying up your desk, although that might be useful for some. I’m talking about defining your immediate needs and long-term goals, and planning your time to accommodate both.

Start with a daily planner. Electronic or paper, it doesn’t matter. Choose a system that gives you at least one page per day, and then make sure you pay attention to the commitments. If a distraction is going to put you off-schedule more than a few minutes, either reschedule your prior commitment as soon as possible or plug the new item into the planner.

Then get rid of your to-do list. Why? Because there is a better way to use it. Transfer the items to a particular time and day in your daily planner. You’ll be amazed at how much your stress level goes down and how much you accomplish when you actually schedule a specific time to achieve certain things.

Give each item on your calendar your full attention during the assigned time. Don’t multitask when you deal with people. It seldom pays off. Whether talking on the phone or in face-to-face conversations, make the other person your top priority. Don’t page through your email or texts, or shuffle papers when you’re talking to someone. Make sure that your communication is clear and focused, which will reduce the need for clarification and other time-wasters in the future. Before you sign off, make sure you have a mutual understanding of next steps and make note of deadlines, which you will naturally add to your calendar.

Reserve enough time so that you don’t have to rush through things or do them over, which is a giant waste of time. Taking your time can sometimes be the best use of your time. Give your brain time to reboot and reprogram for the next challenge.

Finally, once a project is completed, let it go. Channel your precious minutes and hours into the next big (or small) item that demands your attention.

Mackay’s Moral: The race against time is a marathon; never stop training!