'contradictory efforts' is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it to describe two or more separate attempts that are in conflict with one another. For example: The CEO's contradictory efforts to cut costs and increase profits have resulted in mixed results for the company.
Thomas pushes Nina, whose delicacy and precision is never in doubt, to "let go," and her contradictory effort to obey him — to perfect her performance by allowing spontaneity and imperfection into it — is what makes her and undoes her.
That has left officials struggling with two sometimes-contradictory efforts: pumping in water to keep the fuel rods cool and pumping out — and then safely storing — contaminated water.
"We deem such an approach to be contradictory to efforts to sustain stability and security in Afghanistan").
Other challenges are containing the rampant corruption of governors chosen by President Hamid Karzai, better integrating sometimes contradictory international efforts and limiting the degree to which Pakistan and Iran meddle.
Just over a year ago, Mr. Mack added Mr. Quattrone to the firm's executive committee -- a surprise to many who saw Mr. Quattrone's legal baggage and Mr. Mack's reform effort as contradictory.
This is more than missing the forest for the trees; the ideals and aspirations of both efforts are directly contradictory.
However, none of the Dn genes have been cloned, and results from mapping efforts are often contradictory or inconclusive (Ma et al., 1998; Myburg et al., 1998; Liu et al., 2001; Heyns et al., 2006).
His 100-point scale, while admirable in its effort to weigh contradictory evidence, seems relatively arbitrary.
Some scientists characterized the seemingly contradictory findings as a quixotic effort by the public to accommodate incompatible world views.
But Mr. McCain's detractors see his contradictory proposals as a cynical effort to be all things to all people, and as evidence that policy proposals often seem to take a back seat in his campaign to less tangible things like biography and character.
