Productivity 101: Being Efficient Vs. Being Effective

A couple of days ago, a business colleague sent us an email reacting to a blog post on the 4 Elements of a Great Marketing Campaign. He asked us about the difference between being efficient and being effective. Aren’t the two words signifying the same thing? Well, to a certain extent, yes, but not really.

To steal a line from Timothy Ferriss, being efficient will not get you out of the office and allow you to live a business lifestyle design you want to live. Besides, there’s a much better option which comes with being an effective (if not uber-savvy) business owner, which doesn’t just boost the sales ratios in your company, but multiply them.

You could call two hundred unqualified sales leads in a day, and call yourself an efficient telemarketer. But the thing is: you’re not really as effective as you’ve hoped for. Knowing to identify the huge subtle difference between being efficient and being effective is crucial to the success of your business.

So what separates “Being Efficient” from “Being Effective”?

Efficiency refers to the quantity of production in a given period of time. It’s the number of sales leads you’ve generated in one hour. It’s like an efficient egg gatherer who collected 500 eggs in an hour from the henhouse. It’s like an entrepreneur working all day long, every day, and consoles himself every night that he’s done everything he can during the day, and he should be satisfied. Yet there’s that something nagging his mind.

Effectiveness refers to the quality of production in a given period of time. It’s the number of sales leads you’ve generated in one hour and many of them are qualified. It’s that effective egg gatherer who collected 500 eggs from the henhouse and all of them are certified fresh, rotten-free eggs. Okay, you get the picture, and we’re actually running out of a much better analogy. So in a nutshell:

“Being efficient” focuses on performing tasks in the least time, and in the most economical manner possible.

“Being effective” focuses on the desired result, doing core tasks that get closer to the goals.

So which one should we desire?

The answer is a no-brainer: we need both. We need to be always effective everyday in our work. And being consistently efficient at what we’re doing is a big bonus – a secret sauce to accomplishing more things. The principle best applies to sales lead generation campaigns or call center outsourcing, and life in general.

That said, when initiating appointment setting and telemarketing campaigns, or any form of business management for that matter, it’s not just be “We must all be more efficient!” but also “What should we do to be more effective in our work?”

At Live2Sell, we approach everything holistically – integrating efficiency and effectiveness in our outsourcing services. That’s how our call center outsourcing company works and we have helped many of our clients and partners grow their businesses that way, with quality results! Whether you look for topnotch lead generation or appointment setting services, Live2Care offers comprehensive outsourcing solutions. Call us today!