1. Stop thinking doing a good job is the most important thing

Hard work isn't all it's cracked up to be. Performance is only loosely tied to who succeeds:

Via Stanford business school professor Jeffrey Pfeffer's book Power:

The data shows that performance doesn't matter that much for what happens to most people in most organizations. That includes the effect of your accomplishments on those ubiquitous performance evaluations and even on your job tenure and promotion prospects. [Power]

Research shows being liked affects performance reviews more than actual performance:

In an experimental study of the performance appraisals people received, those who were able to create a favorable impression received higher ratings than did people who actually performed better but did not do as good a job in managing the impressions they made on others. [Power]