#126 - Solo: A Revised Look at Working Hard & Working Smart

Working hard has been known as the main pillar of success but is working hard truly all you need to be successful? A quick glance at professions that demand intense effort and long hours such as construction workers and busboys shows that there is no direct relationship between hard work and success. In other words almost all successful people are hardworking but not all hardworking individuals are successful. 
 
In this solo edition of Beyond the Present podcast Daniel will shed light on the other equally as important pillar of smart work that allows you to do better things, do them in a better way, and do them with better people! If you want to work both hard and smart in whatever you do to obtain the best results and improve them over time then this program is for you! 
 
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Episode Transcript:
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS

work, customer, construction worker, hard, hours, day, income, increase, money, people, smart, bad apples, life, arrive, simply, business, success, thinking, higher, job

SPEAKERS

Dan

Dan  00:14

Hello, and welcome to yet another episode of beyond the present podcast, the solo edition. My name is Daniel Molgan. And welcome to this show where we're going to talk about the paradigm of smart work versus hard work. You see, guys, unfortunately, a lot of the times when we talk about success, people are asking me So Dan, I want to be successful. So the only way of course is to work harder. And guess what, I completely agree. I believe that hard work is the essence of success in all areas of life and anybody you look around who are truly achieved and accomplished individuals, you kind of realize that they are real hard workers. But here's the truth are all people who are successful, hard working, I mean, does being hard working itself lead to success or those who aren't are successful, they tend to be hard because that's very, you know, different. For example, think about construction workers think about busboys, think about, I don't know, those who tend to work day and night, basically very little. And they're always working, let's say farmers or working on the field, let's say I know, as I mentioned earlier, like construction workers, so these individuals are hardworking, but they're not rich. So this clearly shows that a relationship between working hard and acquiring major success in life, while that's very, very important, but there's no direct relationship here. Because if we thought that big, you know, somehow being hard working makes you successful, then perhaps the only option you would have is to simply work harder at whatever you did. But the fact of the matter is that that is not the way to acquire you know, major wealth or success. So today we're gonna talk about the other elements of basically success which are not necessarily just about working hard, but rather It's about creating a lifestyle where you somehow tend to get higher and higher on the scale of income as well as profitability. While Of course, from any hard work individual. You see, whenever it comes to any area of life, whether it is I don't know, learning a new language, whether it is to lose weight and gain muscle, whether it is to start your own business, ultimately, there is always going to be an element of what we call sweat equity. That is you have to work hard at it. And that is always there. But the question is this, you can work hard at a task that is inferior, or you can work hard a task that is superior. And it's quite obvious that once you work hard at a superior task, this will yield higher results. So let me give an example here. Let's say you're a construction worker, and you work very hard to work 12 hours per day, at the end of the day, you're going to get your minimum wage, which is about let's say 15 bucks an hour, right? So after having worked all day long and have only slept, let's say I don't know, six hours. So you have have spent a tremendous amount of time working almost 18 hours. I mean, like, that's a lot, right? And at the end of the day, what you end up with is not a lot of money, right? However, what if you know you were a, let's say, Elan Musk, he also sometimes puts very long hours at work. But despite the fact that he might spend sometimes what I don't know 16 hours a day working 18 hours per day working, does that mean that he necessarily makes this amount of money as somebody who was a construction worker? Of course not? And the answer is because Ilan musk works on higher value tasks that will then allow him to yield better results. So in whatever you do, you should ask yourself, first of all, what is exactly my major, basically, path in life? What is exactly my major goal in life? What am I trying to accomplish and what is my main direction? Once you know that you can ask yourself All right, I have this skill. I have this ability. I know what to do with this and that and I wants to build a lifestyle surrounding, basically success in this regard. And then he asked yourself, so how can I increase the value of what I do? You see, working hard is very important, no doubt about it. But of course, if you want to work hard all the time, at some point, you're going to face with some resistance, you're gonna be faced with some difficult because there's only so much time that you can have per day, there's only so much energy that can actually put into your work. And because of all of these things, you generally find it very hard to sustain that level of, you know, very hard work for many years. Because if you do so, then you will what perhaps we'll face with other issues like health problems, like family issues, relationship problems, because at some point, you just simply don't have enough time to actually dedicate to your basically, you know, career or your studies or preparations or all of these things. So, because of this, as you somehow you know, get older and as you go up through the basically food chain You want to focus on not only working harder, but working smarter. Now what is exactly working smart. Working smart can be defined as doing things more efficiently, or working on things of higher values. So for example, let's say you wants to arrive to your destination that is a few, let's say 100 miles away, you have a few options. You can go on foot, you can use a bicycle, you can use a motorbike, you can use a car, or you can use a helicopter. Now all of these options are going to allow you to arrive at your destination, whether you move from this place or that place on foot or on a helicopter, you will arrive there. The question is how fast and at what cost? So perhaps if you want to go on foot, you don't need anything. You don't need any instrument any equipments just you know, start walking, and maybe after a few hours, you arrive there. But if you want to fly there on a helicopter now you need to actually invest in it in advance a helicopter and a pilot's To try to arrive there on time. So this is the paradigm of smart work, which is cost and benefit analysis of what you want to get done in your life, and then trying to create new ways of adding value to your time so that the same amount of hours and days and months and years do you put into a certain you know, activity will then be spent on another activity in order to give you the chance to actually work harder and get better results. So because of this, I want to now start off with challenging the listener with one simple question. From your point of view. What do you think is the best approach and the most important thing to do when it comes to improving the value of your time? Now there are very, you know, various options because the simplest way to increase your income, for example, is to work more hours at whatever job you're currently doing. That's okay. But what are the other ways by which you could probably increase your income while having the same amount of workload? The first option would be to increase whatever amount you charge, you know, per hour, that's one option. Option two is perhaps trying to create a new business, and then having other people work for you. So you free up the time so that there are more people working now this way, you will be spending the exact same amount of time at the office. But since it involves the work of many other employees, you will then have a chance to actually increase the overall profitability. The last one, of course, is to dramatically change, you know, the entire field that you work in and start doing new things and new activism might actually be of higher value. But whatever you do, what truly matters here is how can you start thinking in terms of working smart, and then hopefully, that'll allow you to actually focus your attention on you know, more valuable activities and actually do for yourself in order to you know, gain the most results. So having said that, now let's think of your life. As of now, you might say, well, then you're right. I totally want to just start working smart because I do not want to work hard. Well Now think about three types of individuals in the modern world, we have the one time who is extremely hardworking. We have one type who is extremely, you know, focused on, you know, working smart, but they just don't really want to put in the work. So they are a little bit lazy, perhaps or they have this, you know, dream of those listeners call it the Tim Ferriss style of four hour work, basically, what kind of person and then you have somebody who's going to work hard and smart, so who in the end is going to smoke all of them? I think the answer is obvious, right? So, because of this, I believe that an ideal approach is combining the two because unfortunately, those who tend to you know, look for shortcuts and easy ways of earning, you know, an income. Unfortunately, in most cases do not achieve that. In most cases, they actually find themselves stuck in situations where they simply don't have, you know, an opportunity to fully fathom what they want nor achieve big goals because you know, if you are, you know, working in a marketplace, you're obviously competing with other people in it. And if you want to focus on just working smart, and not trying to put in the effort, then what happens here is you simply fall behind those who do especially if they are also smart workers, right? So because of this right now, I want to ask you a question, ask yourself how much of my time that I put into my work, I put in terms of trying to increase the value of my basically income and my work? Because once you increase your value in the marketplace, of course, you can earn higher income? Secondly, am I really willing to work hard, because unfortunately, laziness is one of those issues that we all have to struggle with on a regular basis, because we want to somehow get the job done, but Well, I mean, there's just the SPN on TV and I want to watch the match and I kind of want to also, you know, hang out with my friends. So I mean, life is short man. So I believe in you know, creating and striking a balance between Working hard and working smart in order to achieve, you know, long term, basically professional goals in your career. So if you really want to make the most of your career, then you have no choice but to combine the two. That is smart work and hard work. So let's talk about both Actually, let's talk about implementing both strategies in your career from today in order to actually make the most of them. So ask yourself, how many hours per day, not per week, but per day understands. Those who are successful did not think of themselves as working, you know, per week. In our society, those who judge their work in terms of basically, minutes and hours are oftentimes the highest paid and the most accessible. And ironically, the least successful ones. Oftentimes they judge themselves in terms of year like how much do I make per year. So just imagine like, for example, a very highly successful surgeon thinks about how they shouldn't how much he makes per hour while Unfortunately, let's say a truck driver might think of how much he makes per year. So you want to first change your time perspective, focus on the minutes and hours instead of months and years. That's number one. And number two, ask yourself, How am I willing to increase, you know, both the amount of time that I work more minutes and hours per day, as well as the quality of those hours, because that's really important. So right now, whatever job you have, you can just simply calculate your hourly rate just right now take your annual income divided by basically 12 to have your monthly income, and then literally count the number of hours you work per week. So for example, if you have a job and an office and you know you do that nine to five thing, five days a week, you can actually you know, calculate like, okay, so I worked for example, eight hours per day, and I work five days a week, so that's gonna be about 40 hours a week. So whatever income you got, you know, two by 40 and boom, you get your basically hourly rate. So that of course gives you a great chance to, you know, figure out, for example, how you can go around it, because let's say if you work for 40 hours a week, then it can actually even go further. So 40 hours a week is going to be 40 times four is going to be like almost 160 hours a month, and then divided by 60 even can get your let's say, you know, hourly or even minutes by minutes rate. And this will then allow you to know exactly how much you're worth. And ask yourself, alright, I make exactly this amount of money every minute, okay? Whatever it is, whether you work in McDonald's, whether you run your own business, whether you I don't know, are a creative type, you know, you're you know, minute by minute rate, and then you ask yourself, alright, so this is my minute by minute rate. Now, how can I increase that there are a variety of ways one, increase the type of work that you do, perhaps we have to move out of McDonald's and maybe start your own for example, restaurant, right? Or perhaps you have to work with better clients. One of the things I really like about working international businesses that it gives me access to a global market, because the same services offered in different countries have very different values. So for example, one service one consultancy service offered, let's say, and I don't know, let's say in Europe could cost you let's say, I don't know, for example, 100 euros per hour, while the same service could cost basically somebody else $2,000 an hour or less if you move to Dubai, right. So by literally let's just moving from, for example, Berlin, to Dubai, you can offer the exact same service and instead of being paid 100 euros an hour you are now listen, pay $2,000 an hour. That's a great move, right? So this is one of the you know, paradigms of smart thinking, How can I offer my service in the best possible location? Or this maybe it's also product depends on the situation, right? Because not all products are sold equal in different markets. And then you ask yourself, How can I find a better way to you know, serve better customers. Secondly, increase the quality of your current customers right now. So you might be dealing with a lot of, you know, bad apples, here's my advice, and it's always been the same, get rid of the bad apples as soon as possible before they spoil the whole pot. You see, there's nothing worse for your success and happiness than to work with people that you don't like. Now, obviously, I mean, we all want to be below you know, in a perfect world, you can always, you know, see a lot of great people great customers are coming, you know, in and out, and you're just so happy. But the fact of the matter is that ironically, a very small percentage of all of your clients and customers at a time will inevitably be those will be called bad apples. And also remember this customer that used to be a good customer could become a bad customer over time, by the changes in circumstances his or her lifestyle or situation in the economy. So just because a customer was the best customer does not mean that he or she will always be the best customer. And in most cases, the opposite also applies. So ask yourself right now, how much stress? How much difficulty Am I experiencing by having these bad customers? If you're working with somebody else, ask yourself in my office, which people are causing me the highest amount of stress could be your colleague, could be your boss could be I don't know, the Vice President. And you ask yourself, Is there any way I could change and not deal with these guys in my work, maybe we should change our department, maybe you should even change your job and get a job elsewhere. But the best thing you can do to increase your productivity is to actually stop working with people that drain your mental energy. And that makes you unhappy. Because the surest way to fail is to work with or for the people that you don't like. So, right now, ask yourself, whether you are working as a secretary and you know in a small company, whether you're working as a You know a doctor privately, whether you're running your own business, whether you are working I don't know as a waiter Do you really enjoy the kind of clients you're dealing with on a regular basis if you wanted to get you know somehow these bad apples if you will out of your life could you get started right away and do so because once you focus your attention on removing these bad apples, initially you will have less income it's true. For example, bad apple customer will make you very you know, feel very upset. But at the end of the day, whether you're a dentist I mean he or she comes to your clinic gets the teeth done and goes now you will be upset and probably even depressed after a while but you get the you know, get your money if the operation you know, the teeth are fixed and I got my money. So, you're saying Dan, okay, so I should tell my let's say, you know, customer from hell who happen to have bad teeth to go home and not come back. And that way I'm going to lose money today as true When you send your bad customers home, you're going to lose money for that day. But what this does is it creates a vacuum free time, and a drive to replace the lost income. You see nature's like this, when there's a vacuum created, this vacuum must be filled. So once you, you know, you know, by yourself and intentionally get rid of a bad customer, you create a vacuum, and this vacuum must be filled. Guess what will fill that, you know, vacuum, a better customer in most cases. So, the same thing applies if you have a job, you're saying, well, then I really feel stress in my workplace. I feel like that my colleagues are abusive, and my boss never understands me. I even told him yesterday that I had a problem with my family and I needed to have a day off and he said I don't care go back to work. So you're saying but then I need the money. I gotta make the mortgage payment. I gotta I gotta pay no. feed my family and I'm telling Right now to quit your job and find a better job, you're saying, but that doesn't make any sense because I have to, you know, feed my family, I'm not really sure about this. So you will end up putting up with the BS of your boss or your staff members, your colleagues trying to make the ends meet, but guess what happens, you will not be engaged at work, you will not be very happy, and your income will not increase. So you will keep accumulating those negative emotions inside. At some point, boom, it bursts. And you say, Oh, I quit. But by then it's too late. Because you have been working to that end job. It didn't like for three, four or 567 years. You did not work on improving your skills. Because whenever you came home, you were so depressed, just had to just you know, chill to get rid of all the stress. So you don't have the time to work on yours to improve yourself your abilities, learn new skills, and at the same time you had no energy or motivation to look for better opportunities. So years have gone by, you have lost your skills or at least you know, remain to the same level. And now have lost the motivation to even look for better opportunities and boom, all of a sudden you say I had it. Or worse yet, your boss says, You're fired. And boom, it's like, what the hell am I going to do? The problem is you are not prepared for it, you are not prepared for, you know, making these changes to make your work smarter to improve the quality of your work, because in the long term, doing the kind of work that you really enjoy, with the kind of people that you like to associate with, will lead to far better results than putting up with the bad clients, the bad colleagues, the bad bosses that somehow give you money in the present, but will then ruin your future and your growth perspective. So because of this, I want you guys to start thinking long term in your careers from now. Whether you are a you know, simple nurse, whether you are I don't know as I mentioned, it doesn't matter what your career is, you should think long term. Do I enjoy working at this hospital do I enjoy being in this Place do I enjoy the kind of people I serve? How can I improve the quality and serve better people? These are the kind of questions you have to ask yourself on a regular basis. And this will allow you to change the way you think, and hopefully be able to change the paradigm of your work that will then allow you to work smarter, those who work smart think long term, so they invest some money and effort at the beginning. so evident, they're actually losing a lot, right. But in the long term, they would be making a lot more than those who simply want to just get through the day and just get a paycheck. That is why it's very important, crucial to start thinking long term, planning ahead and beginning to combine smart work with hard work. With that being said, I will never underestimate the importance of working hard. That's quite important. And if I were to give one advice to anyone who wants to make their lives better, I'd say work harder first, but working hard first is just first There's a second element and that's called working smart. So both are important. And by doing the work on both simultaneously, it's kind of like the wheels can you like drive a car with only one wheel or like, I don't know, a bicycle, you need at least two wheels to get any vehicle running, right? So in this situation, you want to focus on that you want to focus on building the ability to somehow work smarter. That takes effort that takes time, but it is completely possible. Alright guys, that's all the time we have for I hope that this little short talk gave you the motivation to combine smart work with hard work and try your very best to hopefully make the most of your experiences in your workplace. Whether it is you working as an employee or running your own business. It's all the time we have for any questions, feel free to contact me on the social media anywhere you can find me at Dan Mullen and of course you can contact basically the person to show Pouya LJ as well, in case you wanted to discuss things regarding the topics of the show or any other ideas. And of course, I'd like to see you guys in person if you have the chance or simply send me a message and I'll be glad to answer all of your questions. Have a great one guys and take care