My motto in life is to “work smart, not hard.”  In the professional world, the idea is NOT to take on as much work as you can to impress people because you will eventually burn out.  Not to mention, you won’t have time for anything else.   

Ronald Reagan had a great quote about this idea:

“It’s true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?”

Although the late President Reagan was probably stressing his desire to keep bankers’ hours, those words resonate so well today in a context much larger than managing reasonable work hours–the business and investing area.

The Problem With Hard Work

As a society, we are working harder and harder.  Yet, we are making less, saving less, and moving backward.  In school, our teachers inculcate us with the concept that hard work breeds success.  That may be true in the sense that it develops a prestigious reputation.  But it’s not true in a monetary sense. 

The real value of hard work does not belong to us worker bees.  That value, instead, belongs to our employers.  If you are an employee, your hard work creates value–in terms of money–not for you, but for the company for which you work. 

The Employee Gains No Value

You gain no value because you remain on a fixed salary for the term of your employment.  You don’t own your job or the business for which you work.  Your job owns you. 

You probably receive periodic raises during that time, but those raises are small increments.  You save a part of your salary in certain passive investments (mutual funds, etc.), and you rely on paying off your mortgage to create an additional nest egg. 

When all is said and done, you’re lucky if you save $1 million over your lifetime.  (Some will never sniff that figure.)  When you retire, the challenge becomes maintaining the value of your savings (which are in dollars) against a weakened dollar, a higher cost of living, and an emerging global economy that continues to widen the gap between the rich and the poor.

The hard work you put in for 40+ years as an employee didn’t kill you.  But it didn’t exactly make you stronger.  Instead of a comfortable retirement, your security is not assured.      

When And Where Hard Work Is Valuable

Hard work only has value if it is directed towards your own business.  In that sense, your “hard work” becomes “smart work.”  Your business might be a company you started, a real estate venture, an online business, some other investment vehicle, a blog, etc.  Heck, it can even be the lemonade stand you started as a kid!

By creating that business, you are working smart and not hard.  The hard work you put into that business will pay dividends far greater than those you earn as an employee.

As an owner of a business, even if your business is an Ebay store or a blog, you gain a higher rate of return from the work and efforts you put into that store or blog.  And the more value you create from that work, the higher the returns, and the less you will eventually have to work to maintain your business.

Blogging is a Business

Take a blog, for example: When you start a blog, you most likely put in a lot of hours in the beginning to get the site up, post consistently, network, promote it, and find the right advertising. 

All that work creates value in two forms: (1) content and information, and (2) traffic in the form of a huge, loyal reader base.  That value, in turn, provides you with a very high monetary return on your initial outlay of hard work.  Moreover, those returns become lasting and passive. 

They make it possible for bloggers like John Chow and Problogger to work less and have more free time.  They can be a part-time bloggers and put in minimal effort to maintain their blogs, and, at the same time, they can make a great living off that small amount of work.

Hard Work Is Valuable When It Is An Investment

Thus, hard work is valuable only when it is invested in something that is yours–some business or venture about which you’re passionate.  It won’t kill you but, unlike being an employee, it will actually make you stronger because it will create long-lasting value. 

You also won’t ever have to think again of taking a chance at the hard work that makes so many people miserable.

So remember: Work Smart, Not Hard.      

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