Steven Robbins here. Welcome to the Get It Done Guys' quick and dirty tips to work less and do more.

A thank you to Action Day participant Lori, who suggested today's tip. If you haven't joined me for

an Action Day yet, check out this podcast's transcript for a link to my episode on Action Days. They say modesty

is a virtue. Too bad virtue doesn't pay. In my first job as a manager, I assumed I knew what

everyone did. After all, I wandered by at least once a week. All their names started with Jay.

Jordan, James, and I would laugh and laugh, as Justin told us how he hid in the closet, waiting for his wife to come home and jumped out and yelled, boo. I think she was his second wife. We never found out what happened to the first one. Sometimes I'd ask, how's the project coming? Fine, the Jays would say, we all felt peachy keen. Then review time came along. It was my job

to grade them. Hmm. I knew Justin was married and likes to psychologically torture his wife. He gets an A,

and a big bonus. Jordan runs triathlons. That sounds like A work two, with another big bonus.

James? I don't really know what James did. He never told me. He spent all his time in his

cubicle typing. He gets a B and no bonus. After talking with the J's one-on-one, they revealed that

James was actually doing most of the work.

Good news! He set the bar for A-level work. James got an A, and the other two guys got B's.

Since I was only giving one big bonus instead of two, I saved money. And then I got a big bonus for

doing such a bang-up job saving money. Oh, I loved working for a big company.

Want to hire me?

If you've ever had a manager like the younger version of me, you must self-promote.

Otherwise, your boss won't know what you're doing.

Maybe your friendly coworkers will spontaneously tell your boss how great you are.

Yeah, right.

And maybe your pet Ardvark lays golden eggs.

Ardvarks don't lay eggs. So, self-promotion is hard. You're so busy doing great work,

you're not thinking about remembering your great work. With almost effortless ease,

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