"Just Try Harder” and Why This Advice Rarely Works!

In this episode of The Efficiency Advantage, Coach Juli Shulem challenges one of the most common and damaging pieces of productivity advice people hear: “Just try harder.” Drawing from her work in productivity coaching and organizational psychology, Juli explains why more effort is rarely the real solution when people are overwhelmed, burned out, disorganized, or struggling to follow through.

This episode dives deep into the difference between effort and effectiveness, uncovering how cognitive overload, perfectionism, task switching, decision fatigue, stress, unclear expectations, and poor systems quietly sabotage productivity even for highly intelligent and motivated people. Juli shares practical strategies for improving focus, reducing overwhelm, designing better workflows, managing energy more effectively, and creating systems that actually support success instead of draining it.

If you’ve ever felt frustrated because you’re working incredibly hard but still not getting the results you want, this conversation will help you rethink productivity, eliminate unnecessary pressure, and discover smarter ways to work with your brain instead of against it.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Are you ready to finally break free from overwhelm, procrastination, and burnout? If you're ready to focus on what truly matters and create momentum to reach and exceed your goals in business and in life, then this podcast is for you. Welcome to the Efficiency Advantage, the podcast where clarity meets action and purpose that fuels your progress. So here's world-class productivity expert and your host, Coach Julie.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

Welcome back to the Efficiency Advantage podcast. I'm Julie Shulem, your host, and today's episode might challenge a few things you've heard before because I'm going to walk you through some productivity advice that I do not agree with. Not because it sounds bad, but because in real life, working with real people, it just doesn't work. And if you've ever felt like you're doing everything right, but still not seeing results, this episode is absolutely for you. Have you ever heard or been told just try harder? That's one of the worst pieces of advice I have heard people that have been told this in their past. Just try harder, seriously? This assumes that you're not putting in any effort or you're choosing not to follow through. But in reality, most people I work with are already trying really, really hard. They're overthinking, overcommitting, overloading themselves with way too much. And consequently, they are also overwhelmed. And when you think about it, what does try harder even mean? Sitting your chair longer? It sounds actionable, but it usually means almost nothing unless it translates into specific behaviors. Trying harder is generally just shorthand for many unstated expectations, such as pay more attention, make fewer mistakes, work faster, care more, be more disciplined. Oh, don't even get me started on that one. Push through discomfort, stay focused longer, produce better results, stop struggling visibly. No, we don't want to see that. And just figure it out. The problem is that none of those are actual methods, they're desired outcomes. I'm convinced that telling someone just try harder is going, is not going to go over well at all. Because the problem is not lack of effort. It's probably more along the lines of misdirected effort. Trying harder in a broken system just makes you more exhausted. If someone is already exerting significant effort, being told to try harder can actually become psychologically damaging because that implies the issue is lack of effort rather than lack of strategy, structure, clarity, resources, skills, or neurological capacity. It also ignores cognitive load, overwhelm, burnout, stress, sleep deprivation, anxiety, executive functioning deficits, unclear priorities or unrealistic expectations. And it assumes effort automatically converts into effectiveness. Very often, highly intelligent and conscientious people are already trying extremely hard. They are simply applying effort inefficiently or maybe in the wrong direction. A more useful question to ask is what specifically should be done differently? For example, instead of try harder to stay organized, a useful question or suggestion I should say would be maybe check your task list certain times throughout the day, maybe nine and twelve, you know, when it's appropriate. Or how about break projects into tasks that can take less than 30 minutes so you can accomplish things in short order? Or maybe closing email while doing focused work and shutting all kinds of distractions off. That's an actionable step, right? And maybe send status updates before deadlines are actually right in your face. Benchmark deadlines is what I call those. And maybe use one system instead of many, so that you are not having to consult multiple places to keep track of everything you're working on. These are actually observable behaviors, these are things you can do, you can actually make happen. Most people are not going to improve their efficiency by relying on force of will. You can't just wish it to happen. What does help to have actual impact and thus better results is clear prioritization. And this is something I've shared in a past podcast. Having better systems, and you might need to have someone come and set up better systems for you. This is actually one of the things I do with my clients. Reduce decision fatigue. So have fewer decisions you have to make overall around whatever it is you're working on. Another is making sure that you're managing your workload realistically. And be aware if you even know what that means. What is realistic in this particular circumstance that you're dealing with. And another area that you can really have some impact around is improving the sequencing of tasks so that they flow more easily. Kind of similar to running errands in a logical order, so you're not crisscrossing all over town, which of course wastes time and fuel. But this is a way that makes sense. It's a logical sequence of the tasks that you need to do or the projects you're working on. Another area that a lot of people overlook is the design of your environment. Is it conducive to actually being productive? Take a look around. Do you need to adjust some things in your environment? Maybe add some something that might make the lighting softer or make the environment a little bit more soothing and conducive to the kind of work that you're doing. Maybe something needs to go out altogether and just be removed. Another area is look at your sleep, your stress management. How are you recovering from life overall? Because there are a lot of things that can be upset by not taking good care of our brain health and our bodies. Look at maybe needing some new skill development. Are there areas that maybe if you had a better set skill set around, perhaps that would make it easier to do the jobs that you're working on? Another thing is is there something that you're working on that maybe should be delegated to someone who can do that better, faster, easier? Very possibly. So look at the things that you can look you can change and actually make easier. Not necessarily using AI, but automation overall. So look at the things that you can actually affect. And the last one is you know, do you have real good, clear communication with the people that you're actually working with or for? Do you know what you are supposed to be doing? In productivity coaching and organizational psychology, there is an important distinction between effort and executive functioning efficiency. Someone can expend enormous effort while achieving poor outcomes because their cognitive resources are being consumed by task switching, or what you think is multitasking, it's really task switching, perfectionism, overwhelm, unclear expectations. If you don't know what it is you're supposed to be doing, you're gonna just be spinning your wheels. And perhaps emotional regulation, decision fatigue, disorganization, and working memory overload. So when people say try harder, what they often actually mean is we want better output, but we cannot clearly articulate what operational changes would produce that for you. That is why many people feel frustrated or even ashamed after hearing something such as just try harder. It gives pressure without a process, no solutions, just unhelpful advice. So when you are in this situation, either from outside forces or internal ones, like putting this on yourself, ask yourself this question again. What specifically should be done differently to achieve the desired outcome? Or here's another one. Where can I change the way I am approaching this task or project? Where can I change the way I'm approaching this? Or perhaps you just need to step away from what you're working on, take a walk, take a chill break, and see what creative genius you can tap into to come up with a better option, maybe a different path altogether, or another method to have success around what you are doing and trying to get done. Don't just keep beating your head against the wall, or most likely in this case, computer keyboard. Take time to assess the situation. The time you spend doing this will actually come back to you many times over because you were wasting time just kind of trying to make things happen prior. And now you'll actually maybe make some significant progress. I hope you've gotten some really good ideas from this and you have some good takeaways. I want to thank you so much for listening. Let me know what your takeaways from this podcast actually are. You can go to askcoachJulie.com and Julie is spelled J-U-L-I. There is no E at the end, or I'm happy to hear from you via email. You can email me directly at balance at coachjulie.com. And if you're getting value from this podcast, please subscribe. And I wish you a very productive day.

SPEAKER_01 13:01

So that's it for today's episode of the Efficiency Advantage. Head on over to Apple Podcasts iTunes or wherever you listen and subscribe to the show. One lucky listener every single week that posts a review on Apple Podcasts or iTunes will win a chance in the grand prize drawing to win a private VIP day with Coach Julie herself. Be sure to head on over to the EfficiencyAdvantage.com and pick up a free copy of Coach Julie's gift. And join us on the next episode.