You Can Be Smart But Not Effective
You meet some friends that are successful in life. You are happy for them but in your mind you ask the question “I’m smarter than them, how are they richer than me?” No one doubts your intelligence. Even your mentioned successful friends admire your high IQ. To really answer this question in your head, here are some more questions you should ask yourself as a smart person.
- Do you get tired of the process and want to claim things right away? You’re too smart anyways.
- Do you hate explaining yourself or how to do something because you think it’s below you? You’re too smart anyways.
- Do you make annoy people when you state some facts based on your research? You are right anyways.
If the answer is yes to all of these, then you are clearly smart but clearly ineffective as well. You may be smart but you forget to be effective. While your less-smart, rich friends are happy and more relaxed, you keep on thinking “how can I be smarter?” The true question you should ask yourself is “How can you be more effective?”
Here are some key points on being effective:
- Be patient. Go through the steps. Use more steps into your logic. Goals cannot be achieved by thinking of it alone. You have to put action in those goals. Go through the process even if you are smarter than than the process.
- Do not assume. Have open ears for ideas. Continue to learn from others. Listen in and humble yourself.
- Respect opinions. Know that what people are saying are just their opinions and they are entitled to their opinions. Just like you.
- Always be courteous. Respecting others will win yourself respect. You need respect to influence others. You need other to get where you want to go.
- You don’t need to show you are smarter than everyone else. They would learn that eventually.
- See other people’s strengths. Use them. You can’t do everything. Believing in yourself is great but you need to move others too. Use 3 and 4 to win influence.
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Take action. Set your goal, plan it then act on it. A checklist will remain a checklist unless you set them in your calendar.
“It’s not that I’m so smart. It’s just that I stay with problems longer.”
-Albert Einstein
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Face the roadblocks. Sometimes, in fact, most of the times, we are faced with challenges. No one says it’s easy to achieve goals. We all face roadblocks and it’s up to us to solve this to get to the next steps.
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Be responsible. Blame no one but yourself. Take responsibility from your actions and decisions.
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We than I mentality. No man is an island. You need your team and together is better than one. Think as a unit and you will be stronger and more effective.
