It's an interesting question why you can't simply find suckers who like to work hard, and get rich off their efforts while you sit back and do nothing. One reason is that they'd have to be stupid to let you do that, and it's not much use having stupid people working for you, no matter how hard they work.

Another reason is that having people work for you is not zero work for you. You have to tell them what to do, and often this requires a great deal of effort. In fact, it's probably not possible to have good ideas about what to do in some field without at some point having worked hard in it yourself.

I'm convinced that the real money comes from designing good systems. I once heard that the reason McDonald's color codes the register buttons is so that even employees who are basically illiterate can hit the right button quickly and accurately. Brilliant.

The problem with being stuck in a system like McDonald's is that even though it makes the least skilled/productive people much more efficient, it also puts a cap at how efficient you can ultimately get. I suspect the most successful people are the ones that are able to recognize when they are trapped in someone else's system, especially if it's inefficient, and break out of it.

I suspect that's the key to success in entrepreneurship too, designing good systems. What most people don't realize is that the money doesn't come from mastering systems, but from designing and creating them. The guys running scientology are making a lot more money than the guys trying to get to Thetan level whatever.

Not that designing systems isn't work, but at least it's the kind of work that one might enjoy even if one doesn't enjoy toiling away in traditional institutions.

It's hard to explain well since no one ever talks about this stuff, but hopefully this post sort of makes sense.

http://www.amazon.com/Built-Last-Successful-Visionary-Compan...

A) Everyone knows about the importance of corporate culture for knowledge workers. While different businesses might require different best practices, there is still going to be a lot of overlap between different companies with "good" cultures. WHEREAS few people know how to design efficient systems for routinized labor, and the systems will be very specific to the company.

B) Routinized labor scales much more, so creating good systems gives you a lot more leverage than creating good cultures.

C) Knowledge workers don't create wealth in predictable patterns. With the best culture all you can do is make it more likely that someone will create something of value. But with a good system you are actually increasing measurably increasing your yield, just like finding a better catalyst for a chemical equation.

edit: Of course this isn't to say that it isn't possible to design systems for knowledge work also. Public schools are an excellent example of this. (Although, strictly speaking, schools are designed to be like factories so maybe not.)

Since I have a mild fetish for management books, I've drawn a couple conclusions on the whole genre itself. 'Clever ideas' are subjective. I feel that if a book gives you a straight-line recipe to success, then the message has failed because it has overlooked the nuance and gray(grey?) areas that is associated with running organizations and working with people.

Enough of this; back to the topic at hand.

This is also the thesis of "The E-Myth Revisited" by Michael E. Gerber, which I'd recommend given the above comment. It's an easy read that talks about developing systems not just for profit, but also in a way that is ethically sound to both you and your employees and your customers. The book speaks mostly about small retail franchices (an example of a hotel is also given), but it is easily applicable to other areas.

Ford would be one...

oh and an unlucky person considered uneducated doesn't mean is stupid

How do you each define "working hard"? Is it the difficulty of the problem you're trying to solve or is it more so the time spent thinking about and/or physically solving the problem?

I ask this because I often find that at my job, the work is more frustrating than hard. Yet, at the end of the work day, I still feel drained physically and mentally, although the work is not challenging (or satisfying).

I think the empirical evidence overwhelmingly indicates that connections are way more important than working hard. The majority of rich people got there mostly by knowing the right powerful and well positioned people. Modern tech is anomalous regarding the value of hard work and skill. It also accounts for a small fraction of the wealthy.

Carnegie wrote explicitly against hard work and in favor of the value of networks. I'm sure the other robber barons agreed.

Read "They Made America" and see page after page of brilliant inventors of the last 200 years who died broke, but whose inventions produced fortunes for other well positioned people.

"Working hard", by itself, isn't enough to get you rich, and it can often take you entirely in the wrong direction. You can work your ass off and read business books like "Good to Great" or techie books like "Programming Collective Intelligence" (which I bought and think is good), and 10 years later you can still be sitting on your couch, watching TV, thinking "I worked hard, why am I still not a rock star?" I can work my ass off and implement a new Web application in 3 hours, but if nobody uses it I'm still a failure, at least in an entrepreneurial sense.

For every effect there is a logical sequence of causes. If you want to launch a successful company, you have to follow a finite sequence of steps (think of idea, write good code, listen to user feedback, etc.). There is an infinite pool of actions that are NOT part of the sequence of steps that will not help you AT ALL towards starting a great company. The really challenging (yet necessary) part is figuring out what these useless activities are, and avoiding them. Figure out what exactly is necessary and do those things. Don't BS yourself and think "if I just work hard at these X things that everyone else says are important, I will some day make it big."

But I think even if you've figured out exactly what you need to do, a lot of ENERGY and ACTION is needed. Nothing important gets done without a lot of action.

"Working hard" is a bad term, because it sort of implies having a miserable time. I love tennis. When I play tennis I'm running all over the court and diving to make tough shots. I'm exhausted after a match. But I don't consider this working hard, I consider it high-energy playing. I think it's important to not only choose an end result you want, but also to find a process/means for getting to that end result that is so enjoyable that it doesn't seem like working hard at all, but rather like a high-energy game of tennis.

Tapping with a hammer ....... $ 2.00 Knowing where to tap ........ $ 9998.00

http://fridayreflections.typepad.com/weblog/2007/08/knowing-...

Don't work hard, work smart!

If you don't use your brain to plan, replan and think again, even hard work will get you nowhere (or at random places).

Well, surely working hard and working smart can be combined. But there is a limit: I usually stop coding, after it takes me too long to find the right algos. Sure I can go on then with stupid things like taxes, telephone calls and so on. But if I do, I have to pay back for that the next morning.

So basically I would answer the original post with: think!, then work as hard as you can, but get your breaks. All has to be well balanced or you'll burn out. Best is, if you find things that relax and that you'll enjoy while doing more work (having beer with your co-founders ;o).

When I think of working hard in an entrepreneurial context I'm thinking of someone who's breaking down barriers, being relentless, striving for greatness (not just "good enough"), taking on tasks others would be afraid to, etc. Generally just pushing beyond the boundaries of what most people are willing to do.

I know a few people who are ridiculously successful and they all work (or worked) so hard that your average person couldn't handle their workload for even one week.

The other part of the equation is being smart, watching for better opportunities, working on things on the side, or even quitting your job and living off of ramen while founding the Taginatr2000.com.

Contrast this with what he suggests to an Aristocrat in Some Thoughts Concerning Education which should be taught to all children regardless of class.

The point; slaves are taught a "good work ethic"(the same as "working hard") and the ruling class are not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Some_Thoughts_Concerning_Educat...

But as pg said, working hard is necessary for doing something great.

Greatness seems to require a very focussed hard work, though. You not only have to work very hard, but on exactly the right things. Simply putting in long hours coding probably isn't enough.

"behind every great fortune lies a great crime" --Balzac

I feel like your question overlooks something, namely that if your goal is to become successful, then until you do, you probably won't have the "buck" to pay your crazy smart hard-working individuals their worth to work for you. In order to acquire the money to pay them (and them is plural, remember) you're going to have to work for it. And working hard will probably get you that money faster than not working hard.

Finally, your claim about the people whose "financial situation just cannot get better" intrigues me. Who are these people? Do they have extenuating circumstances causing this? Do you find yourself in those same circumstances, or why are you so ready to align yourself with their plight?

Instead of working hard on programming, you are now working hard to get a team of people to create your idea the way you want it.

If you think that is easy, not a chance. Managing people is a lot more work then programming. With programming it is you and the computer. You tell the computer what to do and most of the time the computer complies.

With people, when you tell them what to do they are way less cooperative then a computer and if you think people are just going to be "on the same page" as you are and just come up with stuff that matches what you wanted.. well I have tried that and it doesn't work.

Unfortunately, if you don't already have capital to pay people, you are going to need to build up capital by working... hard.

I think a better way to look at the situation is by separating hard work and difficult work. Godin has a great post on this topic which he just republished Monday. http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/09/labor-day.ht...

... they will either:

- not be as productive (obvious)

- start being deceptive about what they're actually doing (to avoid repercussions)

- finally, they'll leave for greener pastures

I realize you're coming at it from a personal perspective... but it's something for startup founders to keep in mind as they bring on employees / non-founders.

There's a great example of this happening in practice in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuJU1dzc5kM

Leverage.

Yes, it's often used as an empty business buzzword, but that doesn't mean there isn't a lot behind it.

During the day they mostly sleep, which is why people think they're lazy. Actually, their schedule is more aligned with that of startup hackers: work during the night, sleep during the day.

the only difference is that it's a lot more exciting for certain people/scum. which brings me to another point: hard work doesn't feel like hard work if it's your passion

"Tomorrow will be the most beautiful day of Raymond K. Hessel's life. His breakfast will taste better than any meal you and I have ever tasted."

I do find it hilarious though that many of these internet marketing nerds make hundreds of thousands a month while many Web 2.0 companies spend millions and can barely bring in a few thousand in revenues.

Been there, done that. http://www.SystemsCanBeDuplicated.com