When you are efficient, you work faster. This is what many modern companies seem to be asking of their workers, and the early 2000s’ drive for maximum productivity has left people working too hard for no good reason.
Being effective is far more important than being efficient. Being effective means getting things done, making change happen.
You want to be able to get things done, but being efficient and working faster doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be effective. You can be very efficient at organising files in order, only to have them changed and jumbled later because people are always using them. Not very efficient to waste all that time, huh?
Actionable step:
Focus on being effective, making things happen. Let efficiency come once you know that the work you are doing now is worthwhile in the first place.