Chapter Twelve

Blend Hard Work and Smart Work and Learn to Network

There are several ways to achieve success in your life. You must think of a combination of hard work and smart work. It is also important to build a network. In this chapter, we will discuss blending these three for achieving all-round success.

What Is Hard Work?

Most people want to enjoy their leisure and indulge in pleasure; very few people like to work hard. People often adopt shortcuts and easy methods to achieve success but that is not possible. You can achieve success only through your hard work. Hard work is all about putting your efforts consistently for accomplishing your ambitions. An author spends approximately six months to author a book. A producer spends a year for making a movie. It takes almost a year to design a game. However, nobody can predict whether their efforts will bear fruit.

Presently, we are enjoying the fruits of technology. However, technology was not invented overnight. It took several years to build technology through constant creativity, innovation and hard work. Professionals spent several years developing certain software that we are using currently. Let us take the example of the latest iPods developed by Steve Jobs. Jobs took twelve years to create it. Let us take the globally renowned golfer, Tiger Woods, who reached the top slot in his career. Woods was introduced to golf by his father and he practised for many years, and it finally paid off. There is hardly anybody in this world who can achieve success without hard work.

There are some people who don’t work hard despite having amazing talents. Robert Half rightly quoted, ‘Hard work without talent is a shame, but talent without hard work is a tragedy’. God has blessed people with certain talents. There is no point if we don’t make use of these talents through hard work.

Hard work does not imply working hard continuously without taking any break. It is essential to take breaks to get refreshed and recharged with new ideas. There is a need to maintain the right balance between work and a break.

What Is Smart Work?

Nowadays, there is a growing emphasis on smart work. Smart work is the ability to handle tasks effectively. Smart work focuses on how much do you deliver? It means qualitative performance with meaningful results. Smart people don’t ape others. They adopt their own strategies to achieve their goals. Margot Fonteyn once said that she had learnt something important while working over the years. She was referring to ‘the difference between taking one’s work seriously and taking one’s self seriously. The first is imperative and the second is disastrous’. Smart people prioritize their work. They prioritize their tasks in three categories such as urgent, important and least important. Accordingly, they know how they must work to achieve the desired results.

How Can You Network?

In the present world, the phrase, ‘It’s not what you know, it’s who you know’ carries a lot of weight. It indicates the importance of networking. Networking is all about building and developing relations. People get several opportunities to progress through networking. Keith Ferrazzi rightly said, ‘Networking is the key to success in business’. There are certain ways we can develop our network and stay connected with people for mutual growth and prosperity. Here are a few nuggets:

• You can network with people by using social networking sites such as Facebook and professional networking sites such as LinkedIn.
• Attend meetings and conferences in your area of interest. You will meet people from your area of interest and you can extend your hands to them as well as seek help from others.
• Networking just once does not help. It is essential to sustain the network by building contacts, exchanging emails and telephones and through regular follow-ups.

Kay Stepkin remarked, ‘Work is an essential part of being alive. Your work is your identity. It tells you who you are’. Stepkin further went on to say, ‘People don’t work for the sake of working … It’s not the work itself that’s important to them. There’s such a joy in doing work well’. In this world, many people work hard, some people work smart and, a few people network. These are the three categories of people, and the first category of the people are found everywhere. The second category is partially found and the third category is rarely found. The fourth and final category is the wise lot with the least percentage of people. They are the wise workers who blend hard work and smart work and also network judiciously. Hence, be a wise person and blend hard work, smart work and network to achieve all-round success in your life.