Do not ever disrespect work!

If you do not like this headline, please do not read this piece! :) Cheers!

I had a friend with a very peculiar habit of disrespecting any work given to him. I always wondered why he had this nature! As I could understand, he always considered work = money, which is correct, but not completely. And, he probably did not respect the person who was bringing him all this work, simply because the money involved was perhaps, too small.

Neither was he a good communicator. He was either very slow or late to respond to messages to contact or call, which irked people no end! This led many times to him receiving angry messages, especially from his boss/mentor asking to get in touch at the earliest. And invariably, this led to verbal and personality clashes.

Further, in case the work was small, in terms of the money earned, the effort put in by this friend was either lacking or not quite visible. Also, there was a tendency to take such kind of work for granted.

Very soon, this friend lost projects he was working on, or could barely manage to sustain projects. Time and again, one aspect stood out -- the effort was seriously lacking. Finally, the mentor also gave up!

Work, which could have provided him with more opportunities to grow, turned on its head, and consumed him! No one wanted to give him any more work thereafter. It is frightening. However, he was lucky, and got into some other job. Hope he is doing fine now.

Work does not always equal money. You are getting the relevant experience to handle a variety of work. You are getting several networking opportunities, which will stand you in good stead in the years ahead -- provided, you respect your network. Next, you come into great association with a lot of people, and particularly, your good bosses and mentors -- if you have such people around you! Finally, knowledge, which is simply priceless!

No amount of money can buy these four things, ever! And, no amount of money can ever substitute either experience or knowledge!

I have a tendency of loosing my cool when I see such people who do not respect work. Maybe, I am wrong, and I will always be wrong. My behavior and action is not correct. I am not related to such people and should not loose my cool. I have lost friends as I used to loose my cool and say things, which I should not have said in the first place.

Today, some of those friends or people, who received my wrath sometime in the past, are doing quite well. Some among them have even cared to thank me for showing them the importance of work, however small it may have been.

For all such people, who think that work always equals money, here's an advice -- DO NOT EVER DISRESPECT WORK, and DO NOT DISRESPECT THE PERSON who is giving you that WORK.

No one knows what the future is going to be like. What you sow today, you will reap tomorrow. If you do not keep positive thoughts and maintain necessary action that is required for doing work, you will carry that negativity and lazy action on to your future jobs. You may even succeed for a while. But, not for long!

And that's when you will wish: hey, I should have listened to that voice, which wanted me to hear it! Chances are, that voice -- of another friend, or well wisher, or a mentor, or a teacher, or even your parent -- would have been lost by then!