by Brig Hart, Entrepreneur and CEO of R3Global, a sales and marketing company offering support to distribution and author of the book Why Not You? Why Not Now?. On a quest for personal health Brig discovered a little known fruit and berry beverage manufactured in Utah named MonaVie. In just over three years the Harts built one of the largest organizations in direct sales history. They recruited over 1 million distributors and created over 1 Billion in sales.
Coming from a scholastically-challenged background, we first have to start with how you define smart. In the traditional sense, I just don’t qualify. I was a “C” Student in school; I just tried to see my way through. I looked at things from a common sense perspective because I had to. It was called survival. Since I am an ambitiously lazy person, I had to learn to work smart, not hard.
I haven’t had the luxury of being able to make many or any major mistakes in the start-up and development of any of my business ventures. I had to do what made sense or else it meant disaster. With little to no start-off capital, I had to develop the quality of discernment: determining what was “right” or “wrong” about the decisions and direction I had to go. This keeps you on your game and sharp. Thinking for yourself and learning to process is a wonderful yet rare quality these days.
Experience is the best teacher in life, as long as it is someone else’s experience –then it is wisdom. Wisdom is the principle thing, according to the #1 bestseller of all time. I value good information so I can make good decisions that translates into being productive and effective, versus just being busy. Working smart means being humble enough to realize you don’t have to be the source of all new ideas and information. You just have to realize that there is nothing new under the sun. Borrow and adapt the things that work for others and give them the credit for it. You keep the money.
Working smart means I don’t have to re-think things that have already proven themselves to produce the positive results that I seek. I call it “follow the leaders.” Do what they have done, adapt that information to your own field of work and watch it work for you in turn. This is nothing new: it’s called “duplicate, don’t innovate.”
I am on a constant search to improve the way I do things on a daily basis. If it ain’t broke, break it and make it better. A little improvement implemented over time will always increase productivity and profits. Don’t be afraid of change, so long as it is for the better.
Focus and singleness of purpose is key to working smart also. Doing the things you do, and doing them well is key to keeping a business healthy and prospering. Don’t play the other man’s game; create and follow systematic ways that will replicate the desired results you want.
SYSTEM: Save Yourself Stress Time Energy and Money by adapting and replicating a system that works. Now you can be assured of consistent and positive results. Implementing this reliable information will permit progress. Now a business can gain a life of its own by replicating itself.
Invest, don’t spend. Invest in the most valuable commodity we all have: people. Invest your time and resources in people who can buy into your vision and processes so that they can in a sense take some ownership – and so you can gain their loyalty. Now you have less energy being spent so you can see a return on your investment long-term. Making folks feel good about themselves is key to locking in good folks and developing a healthy work environment in which they can prosper and thrive – in sum, smart investment for smart returns. Building synergy into your team will bring powerful results with the least amount of effort. Empower the people with great incentives to foster an atmosphere of pride in ownership.
A thimble full of common sense is worth more than all the intellect of many these days. Over-thinking simple processes brings stagnation in growth: it’s called the paralysis of analysis. To work smart, one must avoid overly analytical people and process. Keep things simple so the masses can understand and replicate the goals you want to achieve. That’s working smart, not hard.
