Hard work has a great power in it. Hard work helped the ancient Roman soldiers win their victories. Hard work built the pyramids.
So should we always try harder? Sometimes trying harder is exactly what we need. But trying harder is not a strategy.
Suppose you want to start a small business. Is your success strategy that you will try harder than everyone else? Can you? Even if you can, should you even start a business if you cannot think of a better edge than trying harder?
The late president of the United States of America, Ronald Reagan, said:
It’s true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?
From what I have read he was a diligent and systematic worker as president, but did not believe in working himself into a frazzle.
Strategy is about arranging to do more with the same resources than would otherwise be done, or to get same or better result with reduced resources. If so then trying harder is not a strategy; it is just a way of applying more resources.
