Self-Smart, Part I: Work Smart

The topic of this installment of the Developing Soft Skills series is how to be self-smart, which really involves two subtopics, being work smart and being career smart. In this issue, we'll focus on being work smart by discussing the following three mantras: perfect is the enemy of the good; when things go wrong, blame yourself; and overconfidence is a deal breaker. The common thread here is to focus your work on what brings the best return with reasonable effort, and avoid behaviors and efforts that become counterproductive or bring insignificant return. In the next issue, we'll focus on building career smart skills.