How to work hard?

Working hard for the best result

If I work a little bit harder or maybe work a bit longer today, I will definitely finish everything.

Can you hear yourself saying this?

If you can, you have fallen in a big trap. The trap which states that more is better. And that by working harder and longer you will achieve more!

Is this true?

It isn’t true! Well, not completely.

We have the wrong idea about working harder. We think that working harder means investing more time in your work. Make lots of hours, work in the evening, at weekends.

However, this is altogether the wrong idea about working hard. When you invest all your time working, you won’t be productive anymore. You probably know this: everything you have managed to finish in that last hour didn’t result in the quality you wanted and it took disproportionally more time.

Working hard means something else: working hard means you manage your time in such a way that you are working without much effort and achieve the result you would like.

The way to do this is a different way than you might think. Working hard means that you really look after yourself. That you sleep enough, exercise enough, eat healthily and regularly. And that you plan things to recharge you.

How to do it differently?

The company physician and Professor Engagement and Productivity Willem van Rhenen has been calling for years that we fail to recharge: ‘I will hear myself repeating this, but it is a good example. The moment my telephone is empty, do I place it for a week on the window seal, or do I plug it into the charger? That is the difference.’ 

Do you want to be able to work hard, you have to pay attention to the flip side: how do you recharge, get energised, recover. And do you allow yourself the necessary time for this?

That is why energy-management is so much more important than time-management. Maybe you should reflect on yourself and find out if you might be a workaholic.

I can suggest you make a list of all the things that energise you and then examine how much time you allow yourself to do these things. The big paradox: the more you allow yourself time to recharge, the harder you are able to work.