Kinda reminds me of the time I met with an executive and, upon realizing a mistake she’d made, she smacked herself on the head and said, “Duh! Should’ve had a V8.”  I think you and I could use a little forehead smacking right about now.

Earlier today I discovered the following text by an unknown author. The questions posed below were just the kick in the pants I needed to re-examine my motives and definitions of success and career significance.

And you know what? I’m breathing easier now. Because I realize the assumptions I’ve been operating on lately were just plain wrong and, frankly, sucking the life out of me.

I trust you will also benefit from the following exercise:

Take this short quiz — it will make you think!

• Name the five wealthiest people in the world.
• Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.
• Name the last three winners of American Idol.
• Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.
• Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for best actor and actress.
• Name the last decade’s worth of World Series winners.

How did you do? The point is, none of us remembers the headliners of yesterday.

These are no second-raters. They are the best in their fields. But the applause dies. Awards tarnish. Achievements are forgotten. Accolades and certificates are forgotten and buried with their owners.

So here’s another quiz. See how you do on this one.

• List a few teachers who aided your journey through school.
• Name three friends who have helped you through a difficult time.
• Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.
• Think of a few people who have made you feel appreciated and special.
• Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.
• Name half a dozen heroes whose stories have inspired you.

Easier?

The lesson? The people who make a difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials, the most money, or the most awards. They are the ones who care.

Once a frustrated corporate minion, Andrea Emerson writes about the unconventional principles that thrust her into a fulfilling career and straight up the chain of command—including a curious promotion that turned her boss into her subordinate. She now helps turn frustrated workers into high-impact, purpose-driven performers by applyiing the wealth of proven strategies found in the Scriptures. Learn more and sign up for 20+ free faith-at-work tools, downloads, assessments and more at www.espressoshots.com.

A dear relative, who somehow thinks I have amazing Internet powers, used to email me: “Please search XYZ on the Web and let me know what you find. And, by the way, I need that by 3 p.m. today.”

Despite the fact that she had Internet access (and even used that access to email me her requests), she just thought I could do a better job, faster. And so I did. I searched for product specifications and prices. I searched for sources for her Masters thesis. I even searched for good vendors in her hometown, even though I live a gazillion miles away.

Meanwhile, something similar happened at work. A “technology-challenged” co-worker often bypassed our company’s IT support and came to me for help each time her computer crashed or a program wouldn’t respond as expected. Eager to please, I’d walk over to her cubicle and troubleshoot with her.

When helping = hurting

Then one day it hit me that all that “helping” on my part was actually hurting everyone involved. It consistently sucked up big chunks of time and energy, hindered my other commitments and kept my relative and co-worker dependent on me to complete their projects.

I realized the best thing, both for them and me, would be to (1) teach them how to execute those tasks on their own, and (2) begin gently saying “no” to their requests so they would no longer be dependent on my assistance and availability. (As the saying goes, “Teach a man how to fish and you’ll feed him for life,” right?)

How to double someone’s IQ (and free up your time)

You may have heard of Tim Ferris, best-selling author of the The 4-Hour Work Week. While I don’t subscribe to all of Ferris’ advice, he does have some good points: “It’s amazing how someone’s IQ seems to double as soon as you give them responsibility and indicate that you trust them.” After equipping his team to make decisions, he says, “[they] now know that I don’t respond to emergencies, so the emergencies somehow don’t exist or don’t come to me.”

Now it’s your turn: Banish those time suckers

What problems can you eliminate today by removing yourself as an information bottleneck and empowering others?

Once a frustrated corporate minion, Andrea Emerson writes about the unconventional principles that thrust her into a fulfilling career and straight up the chain of command—including a curious promotion that turned her boss into her subordinate. She now helps turn frustrated workers into high-impact, purpose-driven performers by applyiing the wealth of proven strategies found in the Scriptures. Learn more and sign up for 20+ free faith-at-work tools, downloads, assessments and more at www.espressoshots.com.

Do not neglect the gift which is in you, [that special inward endowment] which was directly imparted to you…
— 1 Timothy 4:14, Amplified Bible

This verse recently got me thinking about a counter-intuitive lesson I learned while starting a business a couple of years ago.

Being the creative type, I could cook up a great product, but completely sucked at sales, accounting and a couple of other skills needed to run a business. So I immediately hired a business coach with the goal of mastering those areas.

While my coach was invaluable in getting me to think and act strategically, improve internal processes and close a few more sales, one thing became clear: No matter how much I worked on my weaknesses, they remained my weaknesses. Meanwhile, I neglected my core strengths because I spent so much time and energy polishing those weak spots.

One day I shared that concern with Tiffany, a seasoned marketer and business strategist. Tiffany told me something that still rings in my ears today (to be fair, I think she got it from some best-selling business book):

On a scale of 0 to 10, let’s say you were born a 5 in one talent area. You work hard at it, and over time, you climb up to a 7. The problem is that the world only pays for a 10.

Now, I’m not saying we should give up on bettering ourselves—on the contrary: Added knowledge, wisdom and practice are essential to success in any facet of life. The problem is that many of us are miserable and overwhelmed because we’re trying to pattern our lives, habits and performance after someone else’s. The truth is we make the most impact (whether in profits or people’s lives) when we operate in our innate gifts.

Dan Miller, best-selling author of No More Mondays, agrees: “How sad that we often diminish our best gifts by struggling valiantly to develop in someone else’s area of ability.” He adds, “Find an area where you run like the wind, with few competitors. Then you’ll rise from mediocrity and experience uncommon success.”

The advice proved true in my experience. I found success by focusing on what I do best—my “10″ areas—and joining forces with professionals whose skills complement mine.

Along these lines, Dan offers the following rule of thumb for our work strategy:

• Work where you are the strongest 80 percent of the time.
• Work where you are learning 15 percent of the time.
• Work where you are weak 5 percent of the time.

What strength have you neglected while trying to develop a weakness? What weakness can you delegate, delete, trade or outsource so you can focus on your gifts?

Once a frustrated corporate minion, Andrea Emerson writes about the unconventional principles that thrust her into a fulfilling career and straight up the chain of command—including a curious promotion that turned her boss into her subordinate. She now helps turn frustrated workers into high-impact, purpose-driven performers by applyiing the wealth of proven strategies found in the Scriptures. Learn more and sign up for 20+ free faith-at-work tools, downloads, assessments and more at www.espressoshots.com.

A few months ago I test-drove a truckload of tricks, tactics and tools that promised to add hours to my day. I devoured Tim Ferris’ The 4-Hour Work Week and Todd Duncan’s Time Traps. I downloaded desktop alarms and project tracking software. I banished low-impact tasks from my planner and attacked similar tasks in batches. I called my email from my car, firing off messages through a voice recognition device. I downloaded audio books so I could “read” while driving, standing in line at the post office or cleaning the house.

Some of these tricks and tools did ease my workload. Others didn’t fit my lifestyle and just burned extra daylight, batteries and brain cells As I reflect on my immersion into productivity tips and gadgets, I’m reminded of four unchanging principles that work for all of us, all the time. (And, wouldn’t you know it, the Scriptures recorded them long ago.)

1. Good time or project management stems from good self management. One common trait successful people share is the discipline to do the right thing even when it hurts. They understand that significant fruitfulness can’t exist without structure and self control.

If you’re struggling to maximize your time and outcomes, try focusing on managing yourself instead. What’s holding you back? What bad habit triggers (think television, online networking . . . whatever’s hindering you) can you minimize or remove from your path?

2. People who produce significant results consistently monitor what goes into their minds. It’s been said you can judge someone’s bank account by the size of his or her library: People with tiny bank accounts tend to have no libraries, but usually have big TVs. If you’re letting junk in, junk is what you’ll produce.

3. Innovative producers take time to think. Author and PR veteran Mark DeMoss writes in his Little Red Book of Wisdom, “Everyone, it seems, is busy designing, writing, building, producing, implementing—unfortunately, too much of it is divorced from good thinking.” Henry Ford, says Mark, called thinking “the hardest work there is, which is probably why so few engage in it.”

Why do you do what you do, the way you do it? Is there a more effective way?

4. Purpose-driven professionals recognize that how they start each day affects how they finish . Henry Ward Beecher called the first hour of the morning the “rudder” of the day, effectively directing how the rest will go. Career coach Dan Miller writes, “If you get up late, grab a cup of bad coffee and a Twinkie, rush to work fuming at the idiots in traffic, and drop down exhausted at your desk at 8:10, you have set the tone for your day. Everything will seem like pressure and your best efforts will be greatly diluted.”

How about starting each day with a time of focused meditation, prayer and prioritizing? This practice alone will kick you into high-energy, conquer-the-world mode for the rest of the day. Give it a try. (Let me know what happens…)

Once a frustrated corporate minion, Andrea Emerson writes about the unconventional principles that thrust her into a fulfilling career (and straight up the chain of command) at espressoshots.com. This is Andrea’s first contribution to InsideWork.

Take me, for instance. Because I still resembled a high-schooler in my twenties and was often mistaken for an intern, I obsessed over getting  the business hotshots I interacted with to view me as a peer. So I devoured books like Nice Girls Don’t Get The Corner Office and adopted a series of comical measures to appear wiser and more credible: wearing glasses when I didn’t need them, getting a grandma-type haircut, lowering my voice pitch and mastering body language, which included “power postures” and fighting a hair twirling habit.

While personal presentation does matter, it took me a while to realize that my character and spiritual growth were far better business investments. Which reminds me of that whole “you know a tree by its fruit” bit in the Scriptures:

By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.
— Matthew 7:16-18

Jim Gleason, one of my mentors, is known to harp tirelessly on the importance of integrity. And he’s right to do so, considering “a good name is more desirable than good riches” (Proverbs 22:1). Jim says you and I can easily set ourselves apart, earn people’s respect and loyalty if we do this one thing: Keep our word. (On that note, if Jim tells you he’ll call on Tuesday, you can bank on it, even if he has to call from a hospital room–which he’s done before.) Jim takes seriously the biblical directive: “let your ‘yes’ be ‘yes’ and your ‘no’ be ‘no’” (James 5:12).

Since I’m still far from perfect (and, I’m guessing, so are you), it’s important to note that God doesn’t expect perfection from us. But he does expect progression. In Hebrews 5:11-14 we read that “though by this time [we] ought to be teachers,” many of us are still stuck on the elementary teachings of Christ. Rather, we are told to move from God’s “milk” to “solid food,” which “is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves.”

As I’ve learned where my true value lies—that is, in fulfilling God’s purpose for my life and advancing his truth–I’ve quit worrying about what people think so much, except when it comes to how I reflect and represent the God I serve and love. As we fix our eyes on him, there’s no need to worry about a reputation. He’ll do a much better job of handling that for us.

Once a frustrated corporate minion, Andrea Emerson writes about the unconventional principles that thrust her into a fulfilling career (and straight up the chain of command) at espressoshots.com. This is Andrea’s first contribution to InsideWork.