For far too many years of my life, I was seeking ideas to boost the things I could get done. At first, it was tips for better conversion rates, better management styles and more recently it’s pure productivity “getting things done” advice. When you digest this kind of thing for even a short period of time, you begin to realise there is no hack for hard work.

In the least few years, self-help advice has exploded to become a multi-billion pound industry. What was once an occasional presentation and a few books in a store has ballooned to everything from podcasts, seminars and month long courses. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, self-improvement is one of the most important things to do. However, most of the content being produced is not to make you better, it is solely to convince you there is a hack to ‘success’ and to attain it you just need to do this one thing.

That one thing is usually buying their course (at just £1995), but that’s not the point of this post. The fact that people believe there is a hack to everything is really the issue. Everyone wants a quick, easy fix. 5 minute abs, diet pills, a stupid morning routine — whatever it is you are trying to achieve, all these ‘hacks’ are a waste of time.

Everyone who is successful has worked hard (and perhaps had a few leg ups) and there is no replacement for it. I had a long conversation around this topic with my son once, when he was asking about shortcuts to wherever it was we were driving. I explained to him that there is no such thing as a shortcut, at all. There might be ways that appear shorter, or might shave some time off sometimes in very specific circumstances, but they simply don’t exist. They can’t exist. Otherwise, they would just be ‘the way’.

Much like trying to look for backstreets or quiet roads when you are driving, there are no hacks to get to places faster. You can pick up tips, learn different ways, but ultimately, you need to do the work and get to wherever it is you want to go, yourself.