How do you define what you are doing ?

How do you define what you are doing ?

is it in terms of inputs, outputs or outcomes ?

When you are doing some paid work, or working for yourself on something, do you say -

I will work on this for two hours, then that will be two hours work, for which I will be paid.

or

I will work on this specific task until it is finished, and then it will be done.

or

I will direct my efforts towards this high level objective, for example, I will create the most attractive garden in my street.

We probably need to adopt a little of each of these approaches, it would be madness not to. But if you are forever simply allocating chunks of time, with no thought of when a task will finish, or whether it actually contributes to any overarching purpose, then you are thinking like a lowly paid employee with no stake in the business.

If you are focussed on the specific task, then you will work harder and longer on that task, and provided it is worthwhile, and done to an appropriate standard, you will have no problem getting tasks completed, but the task might not be that worthwhile, and it might not contribute that much to what you are trying to do.

If you are focussed on a very high level goal, then you have no real way of measuring what you are doing. These goals tend to be so high level as to be virtually impossible to break down into smaller components that are meaningful. Applying yourself to a high level goal, is akin to religous faith. You just have to believe that you are doing the right thing, and keep going.

To be honest these are all just different hats that we all need to wear from time to time. The real problem is where you never wear a specific hat, and never think in those terms.