Work smarter....

(apologize it has been a bit since my last post... I am sure the world has been waiting on pins and needles!)

Was thinking about that phrase “work smarter, not harder” over the last few weeks. It is something you hear all of the time. At its core this phrase generally means do not waste your time on activities that have little value – focus as much as possible on the things that have the biggest impact. And of course there is a lot of insight we can gain from this philosophy.

But there should be a second part of that phrase. It should go “once you know how to work smarter… NOW work harder”. Working smarter is not a desired goal because we can work less – but a desired goal because now we have a better way to work. With working smarter – the more effort we put out the better we get. Look at world class athletes and musicians – they have clearly learned how to focus their energy on high value actions. But they also work harder at perfecting those skills than anyone. Michael Jordan was famous (infamous even) for working harder in practices than he did at games. Jerry Rice’s training routine was legendary for its degree of difficulty. The world’s great musicians spend their day practicing their instruments for HOURS. The obvious point is that to develop the world class performance you not only have to work smarter, you must work harder.

The great news about this is that working harder is something we all can do. We must be willing to put in that focus and energy into that smart work and be willing to push ourselves. The comfort zone and world class performance are rarely ever in the same neighborhood. Comfort should be a signal to try to do something more challenging. As we work and develop we need to work smarter AND harder. We can push ourselves to higher and higher levels of performance – and the fact that it is our effort that contributes to the improvements is both empowering and inspiring.

How focused are we on what area we need to improve? How do we commit to practicing it more? Find something that you need to focus on – and just see what improvements can happen if you just focus on practicing and working harder on that skill for the next few days - deliberate, focused practice is both smart and hard work. Enjoy it because when you do it you are taking control of your performance and improvements. And while that is hard to do – it is also very smart.