In the beginning of a new activity, there should be a period of

exploration. In relationships, it’s called dating. In college, it’s called the

liberal arts. In business, it’s called split testing. The goal is to try out

many possibilities, research a broad range of ideas, and cast a wide net.

After this initial period of exploration, shift your focus to the best

solution you’ve found—but keep experimenting occasionally. The

proper balance depends on whether you’re winning or losing. If you

are currently winning, you exploit, exploit, exploit. If you are currently

losing, you continue to explore, explore, explore.

In the long-run it is probably most effective to work on the strategy

that seems to deliver the best results about 80 to 90 percent of the

time and keep exploring with the remaining 10 to 20 percent. Google

famously asks employees to spend 80 percent of the workweek on their

official job and 20 percent on projects of their choice, which has led to

the creation of blockbuster products like AdWords and Gmail.

The optimal approach also depends on how much time you have. If

you have a lot of time—like someone at the beginning of their career—

it makes more sense to explore because once you find the right thing,

you still have a good amount of time to exploit it. If you’re pressed for

time—say, as you come up on the deadline for a project—you should

implement the best solution you’ve found so far and get some results.

As you explore different options, there are a series of questions you

can ask yourself to continually narrow in on the habits and areas that

will be most satisfying to you:

What feels like fun to me, but work to others? The mark of

whether you are made for a task is not whether you love it but

whether you can handle the pain of the task easier than most

people. When are you enjoying yourself while other people are

complaining? The work that hurts you less than it hurts others is

the work you were made to do.