Work Smarter, Not Harder

You will so love this!

There actually is a way, a smart little trick for helping
you accomplish what you wish in record time.

It's nothing hard. No tricks. No magic. Just a few smart ways
to change your thinking which will alter your behaviour, which
will drastically change your life for the better!

Are you ready?
(There are only 7 of these ideas to remember:)

1 Be Pro-active.
You can either be proactive or reactive when it comes to how you
act about certain things. Being "proactive" means taking
responsibility for everything in life. When you're reactive, you blame
other people and circumstances for obstacles or problems. Initiative,
and taking action will then follow. We are different from animals in
that we have self consciousness. We have the ability to detach and
observe ourselves, and think about our thoughts and behavior. This
attribute enables us to have the power not to be affected by
circumstances. Between Stimulus and Response, we have the
power to choose the response.

2. Begin with the End In Mind.
Set long-term goals based on "true-north principles". Formulate a
"personal mission statement" to document your perception of your
own purpose in life. Visualization as an important tool to develop
this. You can also develop organizational mission statements, which
he claims to be more effective if developed and supported by all
members of an organization, rather than being prescribed.
This is mighty handy when running a home or in any volunteer
activities you may be participating in.

3. Put First Things First.
Prioritize your daily efforts towards your long-term goals, at the
expense of tasks that appear to be urgent, but are in fact less
important. If it detracts from your bigger ultimate goals, ditch it or put
it way down on the bottom of your list. This will be easy to do as
you already identified where you want to go and what you want to
accomplish in step two: Begin with the end in mind. Delegation is an
important part of time management. Successful delegation focuses
on results rather than on prescribing detailed work plans.

4. Think Win/Win
This describes an attitude whereby mutually beneficial solutions are
sought, that satisfy the needs of oneself as well as others, or, in the
case of a conflict, both parties involved.

5. Seek First to Understand,
Then to be Understood.
Giving out advice before having empathetically understood a person
and their situation will likely result in that advice being rejected.
Thoroughly listening to another person's concerns instead of
reading out your own autobiography. This will increase the chance
of establishing a working communication.

6. Synergize
This describes bringing together the efforts of all people involved,
whether it be in your family,household, whatever. It is a way of
working in teams. Apply effective problem solving. Apply
collaborative decision making. Value differences. Build on divergent
strengths. Leverage creativive collaboration. Embrace and leverage
innovation. It is put forth that, when this is pursued as a habit,
the result of the teamwork will exceed the sum of what
each of the members could have achieved on their
own. “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

7. Sharpen the saw
Focus on balanced self-renewal, this helps you regain "productive
capacity" by engaging in carefully selected recreational activities.

All of these ideas are from Steven Covey's The 7 Habits of Highly
Effective People. I always though it sounded like hokey, self help
crap, but Anne nagged without mercy for years, so I finally read the
thing just to shut her up. Boy am I glad. It changed my life.

There you have it.

Now please go out and be your best!