“Are You a Hard Worker or a Smart Worker?” - Professor M.S.Rao

"When you hire people who are smarter than you are, you prove you are smarter than they are." - R.H. Grant

When the editor of my upcoming book asked me to define and differentiate between hard work and smart work I started working on it. Although we know the meaning of various terms, sometimes we find it tough to put it across in simple and plain language. Then I worked in this way.

Hard Work vs. Smart Work

Hard work involves more of physical efforts while the smart work involves more of intellectual work. Hard work uses brawn while smart work uses brain. Precisely, hard workers work, and then think while smart workers think, and then work. Unskilled and semi skilled workers often adopt hard work while the skilled workers and knowledge workers adopt smart work. Contractors adopt hard work while the consultants adopt smart work.

At times usage of common sense paves the way for smart work. For instance, NASA scientists designed a new pen that can be written in the space with zero gravity by spending exorbitant money while Russians used a pencil to overcome the challenge. What NASA scientists did was hard work and Russians did was smart work.

Hard workers become smart workers only when they learn lessons from their hard work. Nowadays, you are expected to work smart due to the time constraints and demand from clients and all stakeholders. Although smart work is emphasized presently, you need to blend both hard work and smart work to achieve success in life. Remember the things that come easily will go away easily, whereas the things that come hard stay with us forever and we appreciate its value also.

“A lady is smarter than a gentleman, maybe; she can sew a fine seam, she can have a baby, she can use her intuition instead of her brain, but she can't fold a paper in a crowded train.” - Phyllis McGinley

Professor M.S.Rao

Founder, MSR Leadership Consultants, India

Email: msrlctrg@gmail.com

Blog: http://professormsraoguru.blogspot.com

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