Hard work, they say pays but working smart will not only pay, but get the job done creatively and effortlessly. Working smart as a leader, employer, employee, entrepreneur or an individual, is a trait that will certainly assist you in getting more work done, compared to working hard. However, working hard is also an essential foundation for working smart in future. At a certain point of your career life, you need to reduce the excessive hard work and start using your mental strength, which involves working smart. Exploring your mental capacity and using it to solve problems in a not too common format is a method that has been used by so many successful people in the world today.
Once you’ve mastered the act of using your mental strength, it will be easy for you to accomplish more than the person dwelling only on physical efforts to get a task done. It is important to understand that success and failure can also be as a result of hard work, hence the fact that you are working tirelessly does not entail that you are as productive as you think you are or ought to be.
Sometimes you get confused when someone else completes a hectic task in a short time, effortlessly and without going through half the stress you encountered when executing the same task. It’s not magic or luck, it all has to do with using your head, thinking out of the box and employing creative methods to solve problems. After a long period of working hard, we get to a stage where we know that we can’t get far by working hard only. We need to start working smart as well, to get optimum results out of our time and efforts. Though working hard will give you results, does it give you the results needed to be truly successful? This is the question you should ask yourself whenever you’re breaking your back working.
If you’re one of those who work hard throughout the day, but still feel like you’re not making a difference or getting the recognition you deserve, it’s high time you reexamine yourself as well as employ new strategies to work. Here are few things you can do to work smarter and change your rigorous perspective to work. The first thing you need to do is to start using your head. When you make more use of your mental strength and reduce focus on how huge a task is coupled with the work needed to be done, you open your perspective as well as explore creative tendencies.
Prioritizing is one of the major things needed to help you work smarter. It has to do with the plain method of outlining, either in your head or on a sheet of paper. Writing out steps on how to accomplish a task, makes it easier and faster to manage. Always have a checklist, follow it as you have outlined it and stick to it. This will avoid repetition of steps, making mistakes or forgetting major details.
Unrealistic goals contribute to making the job strenuous, frustrating and will certainly lead to no results. It’s best to cancel those unrealistic goals on your list, so you can meet deadlines and get the job done. Always make out time to go through your work, so all your hard work won’t be in vain. It’s just like proof reading a long essay, so you can get a good score by correcting all grammatical errors. If you don’t proof read, you wouldn’t notice the errors and might be scored low. Hence all your efforts would then be in vain. Ensure you work systematically; this is part of using your head and working smart. Avoid multi-tasking and going back and forth with two or more activities. Pick an activity to work on, put your best into it and make sure it’s done efficiently.
Time management cannot be over emphasized when it comes to working smart.
If you manage time effectively, you will tend to be more focused and productive, and spending less time on irrelevant works gives you more time for the major the major work to be done. It’s better to specify the tasks that should be completed and the time frame for completing them; than setting strict deadlines that may lead to excess stress and frustration. Try and assign a certain amount of time to reach each goal on your list.
A smart worker does not work alone, but uses the available human resources to execute tasks.
You don’t to do it all; there are other people who are very capable of handling some of the tasks you keep for yourself.
If a particular kind of the job is not in your field of expertise, its best to find help and make the job faster. Delegating the job to someone who is skilled at that area is a better choice, though some people prefer to do things by themselves either not to disturb others, have all the benefits for themselves or want to take all the glory. Delegating is a very good work ethic, and sometimes asking for assistance gets you more ahead than just doing it all by yourself. Moreover to attain success; you need to allow others help you.
In addition most people work hard with the mindset that they are doing the right thing, but they fail to understand if they are doing the right thing or working on the right thing.
photo credit; huffingtonpost
