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The lazy person's guide to high achievement
Saturday, 13 August 2005
Many people who know me well think that I'm a bit lazy. Yet I've achieved more in my life than almost anyone I personally know. How did I do it?
The answer is that being lazy but ambitious is a powerful combination.
Most people are taught that hard work is the only way to get ahead - that to want to work hard and sacrifice is a virtue. They believe that perfectionism is a wonderful character trait.
Yet I know many people who are hard working perfectionists and actually achieve very little.
The truth is that the philosophy of effort for its own sake and the obsession over details are nothing more than another form of procrastination. Perfectionism is a type of mental lethargy where the effort itself is seen as the main achievement, with little focus on the end goal.
This behavior seems bizarre to me, and I've never been able to satisfactorily explain it. I suspect that it might be a subconscious way of putting off ever getting anything done - like the student who suddenly decides that cleaning her room is much more urgent than finishing an overdue major assignment.
I've known many perfectionists in my time. It's astonishing how much effort they put into any task and how few tasks they ever actually complete. I've even been involved in a few projects with perfectionists, which I found to be an incredibly frustrating experience. Immediately that such a person begins anything, they will lose all sight of the end goal and get bogged down in some minor and often meaningless detail. They will spend days, weeks and even months getting something right that no-one even cares about.
In the meantime, the non-perfectionist lazy person will have completed the task and moved onto something else.
For it's the lazy who rule the world. Those who want to achieve the most with the least amount of effort are the true builders of great things. That's because the lazy person asks the most important question towards achieving any goal.
The question is: How can I do this with the least possible amount of effort?
If you ask this question before attempting any task, you will become a high achiever too. When you have identified your goal, look for the shortest possible path to achieving it.
To demonstrate, let's look at the example of two men who want to start a local newspaper. One of the men is a lazy high achiever, the other a perfectionist. Both start out with the same amount of money to dedicate to the project.
The first thing the lazy high achiever will do is start hiring people to undertake the many tasks necessary to get a newspaper started. He'll pull in editors, journalists, printers, graphic layout artists, accountants and business managers. If he can't afford to hire everyone he needs, he'll make do with what he can afford. The most important thing is that he does as little work as possible himself, preferring to delegate it to others.
The perfectionist, meanwhile, will try to do everything himself. He'll spend his first two weeks just choosing a name and designing a banner for his newspaper. Eventually, he'll realize he has to hire other people. However, no one he interviews seems good enough. He goes through hundreds of resumes and talks with tens of people before deciding to make even a single hire.
Meanwhile, the lazy high achiever has a team of journalists writing articles for the first issue. He's already arranged a contract with a printing company to get the paper printed. It's probably not the cheapest or the best company in town, but the most important thing is to get the first issue out quickly and start earning money. He can spend more time looking for a better printing company later.
The team he's assembled are doing a lot of jobs they haven't trained for previously as he can't afford a specialist for every task yet. He encourages them to just get things done the best they can. It doesn't matter if the first few editions aren't absolutely perfect, they can work on refining the quality and the systems once they have a product that's bringing in money.
During the same period, the perfectionist has sacked the only person he's hired so far due to what he perceived as incompetence. He's finally chosen a name for the newspaper and is reasonably happy with the banner he's designed. He's been looking around for printing companies, but none of them seem to be able to produce the quality he desires. He's working on what he's sure will become an award winning article that will feature in his first edition.
Two weeks later, the lazy high achiever releases his first edition. It's not the world's greatest newspaper, but it fills a gap in the market and has already attracted a number of advertisers.
The perfectionist is still working on his feature article and is searching other states for a decent printer. He picks up a copy of his competitor's new edition and sneers at what he perceives to be its low quality. He's hoping to get his first edition out by the middle of next year.
Hopefully, this example has demonstrated to you the importance of taking a lazy approach to achievement. Get your goal done as quickly and with as little effort as you can. You can always work on perfecting the outcome later.
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