How to Get More Done With Less Work
The mountain peak looms overhead. It’s so close you can almost feel the rough rocks and powdery snow. The journey, though, will be quite long as you navigate the winding switchbacks to the top of the trail (switchbacks are the paths that go back and forth instead of straight up). Obviously, there’s a major temptation to fight through the underbrush and go straight to the peak. Plenty of less-experienced hikers succumb to this temptation and end up in a rough spot. They could cause a rock slide, damage wildlife, or get stuck where they can’t go up or down. Imagine that mountain is your goal — it’s the achievement you’re working towards. The path you travel is how you are getting towards your goal. People who skip the switchbacks and hike straight to the top of the mountain are the ones who put in tons of effort to get immediate results. This is risky and can end up causing major catastrophes. Those who simply follow the switchbacks have to use less effort. They’re people who opt for more consistent work that will take a long time to accomplish the goal. This analogy shows the importance of understanding how much effort you’re putting into your life and what results you are seeing. Neither extreme is good. People who try to go straight to the peak will tire out, but people who barely go up at all will see no progress and quit. Life is all about finding a balance between the effort you’re putting in and the results you’re seeing; here’s how you can do it in your daily life.
Build lots of smaller goals
90% of goal-setting advice centers around building bigger goals and making detailed plans to achieve them. The plans need to be aggressive and get lots of things done every day.
Much of the time, people end up putting in tons of effort and tiring out before they can accomplish the major goal.
Combatting this requires you to build smaller goals that you can reach every day. If you want to be a millionaire, turn that into small things you can do every day.
Here’s the truth about life: Anyone can do anything for a day.
You might not be able to grind and work at challenging things for weeks and months at a time, but you can do things just for one day.
Set objectives for yourself to accomplish each day and go for them. You can still think and dream about the final goal, but put your focus on the daily goal to accomplish great things.
Apply the Pareto principle
The globally renowned Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, is one of the most important keys to getting more done with less time and effort.
Most people have heard about this principle, but few know how to apply it to their daily lives.
The key is to test different strategies — don’t just put your head down and work. Try different things and actually measure their effectiveness.
If you don’t use different strategies, you can’t found out which ones are in the 20% of the work, causing 80% of the results.
As a writer, you can find out what parts of your articles are connecting with people. Try some articles where you use very few quotes and mostly explanation. Try some with lots of pictures and some with none.
Testing all these varying article types will let you see what is having the biggest impact on your success. Then go all-in on the key factors and make the most of them.
Anyone who really applies the Pareto principle will realize that life is a constant test of what actions create real, lasting results in their lives.
Stop worrying about the time you work
“Measure progress — not the time that you’re working.”— Frank Sonnenberg
No matter the public opinion or what anyone else says, the hours you work don’t really matter. As Frank Sonnenberg says, it’s about what you can get done in those hours that matters.
Lots of people find how effective they can be if they don’t work twelve hours a day, but they feel pressured to keep insane hours.
Culture tells us that you’re defined by your hard work — whether you skip sleep and health and spend all your time at the office.
A major key to success is ignoring everyone else and working in the most efficient way you can find. Don’t rush straight up the mountain but don’t follow the shallowest switchbacks.
People will pressure you and look down on you if you start working more effectively. Achievement will come if you can ignore them and do what gets results.
Take time to do nothing
Meditation, mindfulness, and quiet time. They’re all small things that are growing in popularity. People understand that they need time in their lives to just be.
Although all of these things have incredible health benefits, they’re also great for being more effective with how you work.
Imagine how much more effective you’d be if you took all morning on Monday to plan your work for the week. What would happen if you could set your goals and plan every minute towards achieving them?
My guess would be that you’d triple your productivity, even if you did less in general. Activity is not always progress, as Paul Gauguin illustrated when he said, “Stressing output is the key to improving productivity, while looking to increase activity can result in just the opposite.”
Dumb bosses love people who run around work for twelve hours a day. They like people who show off their energy and hard work.
Smart leaders love people who get their work done. They don’t care if that person works for 80 hours a week — they care if they can be effective with their time.
A big key to this effectiveness is taking time to ponder about your life and what you should do. Anyone who does this will see an immediate spike in how much they can do.
Conclusion
Hard work is a necessary virtue if you want to achieve anything. Working smart is necessary if you want to achieve all your goals.
People who work smart understand the four principles mentioned above:
- Build lots of smaller goals.
- Apply the Pareto principle.
- Stop worrying about the time you work.
- Take time to do nothing.
Effectiveness doesn’t come from following the rat race and rushing around. It comes from being still, thinking, and doing the right things.
Gurus around the world love to talk about working smart, not hard. It’s an overstated thing, but people who can really think about their life can find ways to improve it.
Recognize that not all activity is effective and not all boring time is wasted. Humans aren’t machines — they need time to think and study to be more effective.
