Covid has shattered our perceptions on nearly everything, especially our attitudes to work. Within weeks, systems that had been operating steadily for years were changed radically. New workspaces and work methods were newly constructed overnight. This change called for adaptation and creativity.

In the midst of this radical gearshift what does working like the best mean? The best? The best of what? 

What standards are we measuring against? Our own? The standards of those around us. Who decides what is the best?

The hustle culture

And then come the hustle culturists. They celebrate hard work for everyone. They claim that the road to success is not easy. But more work means more efficiency. This hustle culture extends to every individual, the entrepreneur, the housewife, the student, the factory worker. Hustle culturists work with a sustained sense of competitiveness. They have high energy levels, huge motivational aspirations.

So, isn’t it good to celebrate work, good to maintain high energy levels, and good to have a degree of competitiveness? I suppose like everything else, the problem arises when we go to extremes. 

The extreme of constructing our identity solely through our work. The extreme of working at such high levels of intensity that we experience inevitable burnout.

The extreme of losing sleep, fracturing relationships and becoming difficult to live with, because of a toxic sense of competitiveness. None of us wants this. And none of us wants to be defined as a tired, obsessive, and or unproductive hustle culturist.

The antidote?

We hear a lot about work/life balance. Balance, that lovely word, the mean between two extremes of the stressed hustle culturist and the lazy do-nothing procrastinator?

‘Deep work'

Sometime last year I heard the term deep work for the first time. I must admit I didn’t like the sound of it too much.  It conjured up ideas of manic work and stress. However, when I actually googled the words, ironically, I discovered that all my working life I had been doing deep work. 

As many of you might know, Cal Newport coined the term ‘deep work’.

For Newport, deep work means focusing on a demanding task that involves the intellect/mind without getting distracted. With deep work, you get better results in less time.

Newport’s main tenets are: 

• Focus on a small number of important but essential goals

• Act on lead measures - in other words, do that thing now that needs doing. Weed the garden. Clean the room. Write that chapter.

• Review progress - establish accountability. Keep a scoreboard and be honest with yourself about how you spend your time and how you manage your priorities.

• Develop Flow. Time stops with flow, things get done. Flow gives great feelings of accomplishment. Flow can help distract you from your problems, and maybe provide you with greater insight into them later on.

• Give yourself goals and deadlines. 90 minutes to finish that job. This helps you stay on track. 

• Use commute times or repetitive tasks to work out concepts. Use trapped time to work on knotty sections of your deep work.

Shallow work

On the other hand, Newport defines shallow work as unproductive busyness. Like me you might recognize it in yourself when you check emails with no real purpose, or simply give the impression of being busy.

Conclusion: like the best …

I think we can all agree that we would like to remain healthy both physically and mentally. We would like to make life a bit easier and more pleasant for those around us. 

How can we try and achieve this in our lives?

Maybe working really well so that others can benefit more from what I do?

Could it be developing greater self-discipline to finish work, and not letting myself get carried by the buzz of doing and achieving things? Frequently keeping in mind, the why of my work,  to try and serve others better can help to inspire us. Doing our work as well as we can and keeping an eye on our other commitments can be the way to work like the best, perhaps.

For all of us it can involve different things. But putting limits on the working day and getting a form of work/life/rest balance can enrich our relationships and the quality of our lives.

It might mean learning to say No more often.  Because for all those No’s we are empowering ourselves to say Yes to many other more important things. Yes to others, our families and our loved ones.