Being Busy

April 18, 2021

​​​​​​​​​ Seth Godin the American author and former Dot com business executive talks about how to being busy is not the right way to show your proficiency at work.

According to him, nobody is supposed to give you a pass because you were full on, all day. Frantically moving from one thing to the other, never pausing to catch your breath and getting exhausted is not exactly the right way to work.

He argues that there are no points for being busy.

Rather he recommends that there must be Points for successful prioritization. Points for efficiency and productivity. Points for doing work that matters.

No points for busy. It is always a choice that we need to make between Hard work vs. Long work

Long work he says is like what the lawyer who bills 14 hours a day filling in forms does.

Hard work is what the insightful litigator does when she synthesizes four disparate ideas and comes up with an argument that wins the case–in less than five minutes.

Long work has a storied history. Farmers, hunters, factory workers… Always there was long work required to succeed. For generations, a huge benefit came to those with the stamina and fortitude to do long work.

Seth states that hard work is frightening. We shy away from hard work because inherent in hard work is risk. Hard work is hard because you might fail. You can’t fail at long work, you merely show up. You fail at hard work when you don’t make an emotional connection, or when you don’t solve the problem or when you hesitate.

He summarizes that it is worth noting that long work often sets the stage for hard work. If you show up enough and practice enough and learn enough, it’s more likely you will find yourself in a position to do hard work.

In addition, Seth concludes that no matter how much long work you do, you will not produce the benefits of hard work unless you are willing to leap.