“Working Smart, not Hard” is a popular get-rich-quick concept among workers in today’s business world. Although there is a great difference between working hard and working smart, most of the time employees mistake “smart work” for only doing the bare minimum while getting a fat paycheck at the end of each month. This is not actually the case for nothing can be achieved without hard work. However, there are some strategies that can be employed to help you work smarter by reducing the amount of energy you put on to accomplish each task. Akhtaboot reveals 6 techniques that can help you achieve more with half the time.
Focus on Important Tasks First
Have you ever felt like you spend a lot of time being torn between multiple tasks, but at the end of the day you don’t feel like you’ve really accomplished anything significant? When it comes to working smart you need to focus on completing the most important tasks with the greatest impact on your career and company goals. An excellent way to find out your key tasks is to narrow down your three most important items for the day by asking yourself: “If I could only do three things today, what would I feel the most fulfilled in doing?” Understand your working habits and what tasks take you the longest time to complete and do the most tedious on the times you are most productive.
Shortcuts are Allowed
We all perform dozens of similar actions every day. But what really makes smart employees different is that they always try to optimize work processes to get things done faster and more efficiently every day. Taking shortcuts doesn’t necessarily mean that your work will become less valuable or complete, it means, analyzing the flow needed to accomplish tasks and then understanding if that whole process is necessary. Try to come up with smart ways to complete the same assignments with the same outcome, but in a more resourceful ways.
Dare to Delegate
It goes without saying that we only have 24 hours a day; so our valuable time should be used in places where we can make the most impact. For the lower impact tasks that needs to get done such as administrative work, make sure that it’s delegated to someone else. If you are a business owner, study the aspects of your work such as accounting and design that can be outsourced to others. Smart employees know that there's no need for them to learn and get hands-on on every single thing, especially if it's not related to the core of their job. Being a perfectionist sometimes prevents you from achieving more. Let go of the perfectionist mindset and stop obsessing about the minor details and specifics of the tasks delegated to others.
Keep your Losses to a Minimum
Everyone hates to fail but what most people don’t realize is that failing is an essential part of success. Working smart is all about learning from your bad moves and overcoming them. Don’t invest your time and your resources into a lost cause, there’s no point. Do what you can to salvage the situation and understand what went wrong and why, and then move on. Make sure that you don’t repeat the same mistake twice in the future.
Stay Ahead of the Learning Curve
Working smart is all about your ability to see the big picture. You need to constantly work on your skills and knowledge if you want to position yourself as an indispensible part of the company. Don’t narrow your scope as you need to be able to adapt and evolve with the times. Keep in mind that companies no longer focus on the number of working hours spent on the job but on how flexible and adaptable employees are.
Stop Feeling Guilty About Time-Off
Many employees choose not to take time off due to too many responsibilities or stress at work. While some simply claim that they do not have the time and resources to plan a holiday, smart workers understand that a tired person can’t do meaningful work. Asking for a vacation can be done the smart way too. Plan your holidays during the slowest season is one example of this. Another suggestion is to plan for how your most critical tasks will be covered before you leave with the help of your colleagues.
For some reason people seem to think that they have to be miserable for the first few years of their working lives in order to get anywhere on the professional level. Lots of younger people have this notion that if they work hard, everything will be fine and fall into place for them. This is the wrong way to go about trying to succeed. In this day and age it’s not about the experience you have but your ability to learn and apply what you have learnt that makes you most valuable.
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