Right Attitudes

Ideas for Impact

Motivation

Always Demand Deadlines: We Perform Better Under Constraints

By Leave a Comment

Always Demand Deadlines: We Perform Better Under Constraints Whenever someone requests something from you, or when you embark on a task yourself, it’s essential to always establish a clear deadline.

Having a well-defined timeframe instills a sense of urgency, raises the stakes, and promotes accountability. These elements are crucial for igniting motivation in just about anyone.

The presence of a looming deadline, whether self-imposed or externally set, can trigger a primal fight-or-flight response. This response releases adrenaline, which can be a powerful asset in surmounting tasks while making distractions far less tempting.

Deadlines serve as effective filters, cutting away unnecessary fluff. According to Parkinson’s Law, a task will often expand to fill the time allocated to it. Having a deadline curtails this tendency and shields you from the relentless pursuit of perfection.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Personal Energy: How to Manage It and Get More Done // Summary of ‘The Power of Full Engagement’
  2. Did School Turn You Into a Procrastinator?
  3. Get Unstuck and Take Action Now
  4. Don’t Do the Easiest Jobs First
  5. Keep Your Eyes on the Prize [Two-Minute Mentor #9]

Unlocking Motivation: The Power of Starting Small

By Leave a Comment

Unlocking Motivation: The Power of Starting Small When you find yourself trapped in the inertia of inaction, weighed down by the anchor of procrastination, and it seems like the lack of motivation is insurmountable, a little trick can help you navigate the resistance holding you back.

Imagine a chilly, overcast day when the mere thought of a 40-minute walk feels daunting. Try this: tell yourself, “I’ll just do five minutes.” Your brain is far less likely to put up a fight in response. Surprisingly, once you’re out there, those initial five minutes often evolve into a more extended and productive walk.

This little mental game can be the key to unlocking your motivation.

Aiming low isn’t just for those labeled as underachievers. On the contrary, setting the bar low can be your secret weapon for overcoming the fear of failure.

There’s indeed something magical about focusing on the bare minimum. Aiming low acts as the spark to get you going and transforms the game into ‘easy mode.’ In contrast, constantly reaching for the stars may, more often than not, sink you in the quicksand of demotivation.

Idea for Impact: Start small. With a modest little spark, you’ll see motivation embark.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Don’t Try to ‘Make Up’ for a Missed Workout, Here’s Why
  2. If Stuck, Propel Forward with a ‘Friction Audit’
  3. Use This Trick to Make Daily Habits Stick This Year
  4. Resolution Reboot: February’s Your Fresh Start
  5. How to Turn Your Procrastination Time into Productive Time

The Best Way To Change Is To Change Your Behavior First

By Leave a Comment

How 'Faking It Till You Make It' Could Help You Change Visualize change as a triangular framework, with thoughts, emotions, and behaviors as its vertices. Manipulate one element, and the other two inevitably respond. When your thoughts evolve, your emotions and actions undergo transformation; altering your emotions can reshape your thoughts and behaviors, and changes in behavior can impact your thoughts and emotions.

This symbolic triangle acts as a guide for fostering meaningful change. It provides the flexibility to choose the route that best aligns with your individuality and circumstances. Start somewhere.

Idea for Impact: If you find yourself at a crossroads, acknowledging the necessity for change but waiting for the mental and emotional shifts to emerge, take a gentle step in the right direction. Embrace the timeless wisdom of “acting as if” or “faking it until you make it.” By altering your actions, you’ll soon notice your thoughts and emotions falling in line, per the Self-Perception Theory. Commitment becomes a potent catalyst for transformation—remember that your self-concept isn’t solely shaped by existing beliefs and emotions but can also be molded by your behavior.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. How to … Change Your Life When Nothing Seems to be Going Your Way
  2. Acting the Part, Change Your Life: Book Summary of Richard Wiseman’s ‘The As If Principle’
  3. Be Kind … To Yourself
  4. How “Shoulds” Trap You into Catastrophic Thinking
  5. The Comfort Zone Isn’t the Problem

Job Crafting: Let Your Employees Shape Their Roles

By Leave a Comment

Job Crafting: Let Your Employees Shape Their Roles Employees invest a quarter of their lifetime in the realm of work; therefore it becomes a moral imperative to allow some of their waking hours to be a canvas upon which they paint the strokes of purpose and significance.

Isaac Getz, professor at Paris’s ESCP Europe Business School and author of the bestselling book Freedom Inc. (2012,) asserts that granting employees autonomy can tailor their learning and development and unlock the doors to realizing their full potential: “A company is liberated when the majority of employees have complete freedom and responsibility to take any action they themselves—not their boss—see as being best for the company’s vision and purpose.”

Idea for Impact: Encourage job crafting. Within reason, allow employees to take the initiative to actively and intentionally shape the contents of their jobs to better align with their skills, interests, and motivations and make them more purposeful. It’s a key talent retention strategy.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. These are the Two Best Employee Engagement Questions
  2. People Work Best When They Feel Good About Themselves: The Southwest Airlines Doctrine
  3. Putting the WOW in Customer Service // Book Summary of Tony Hsieh’s Delivering Happiness
  4. Treat Employees Like Volunteers
  5. A Rule Followed Blindly Is a Principle Betrayed Quietly

How to (Finally!) Stop Procrastinating, Just Do It

By Leave a Comment

Go to the gym consistently and unfailingly, even if it’s just to walk on the treadmill for ten minutes.

Even if your legs are sore, just go.

Even if you’re not feeling it, just go.

Even if there’s that something else you’d rather be doing, just go.

Just go.

Because once you’re there at the gym, you usually will get into the mood to run or achieve something more substantial.

Just do it.

Compel yourself to do just a bit of what you’re struggling to do.

Just taking action, even if you don’t plan on achieving much, can usually help you get and stay motivated.

Inertia will give way to momentum.

Idea for Impact: The “Just Do It” attitude can help you surmount mental blocks. Folks who actually get things done work at whatever they are interested in, even when they don’t feel like doing it.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. Five Ways … You Could Stop Procrastinating
  2. How to … Make Work Less Boring
  3. How to Turn Your Procrastination Time into Productive Time
  4. 5 Minutes to Greater Productivity [Two-Minute Mentor #11]
  5. An Effective Question to Help Feel the Success Now

Where Empowerment Fails

By Leave a Comment

Empowerment—giving employees greater autonomy—boosts engagement and creativity. It builds job satisfaction and improves retention. However, the success of empowerment initiatives depends on the personality traits of the managers implementing them down in the trenches.

Middle managers who value behaviors like team orientation, collaboration, and respectful interactions are more likely to enable their teams to set their own goals and entrust them to complete tasks in their way. But many managers in hierarchical structures embrace a certain command-and-control reflex that gets triggered in positions of power. Empowerment means transferring power to someone else, something they loathe. The alpha dimension to the personalities of these managers ends up micromanaging and impeding the autonomy of those in their team.

Idea for Impact: Relinquishing control over others and trusting employees not to abuse that responsibility isn’t easy for most managers; it takes someone very self-confident and secure to discharge empowerment.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. To Inspire, Pay Attention to People: The Hawthorne Effect
  2. Don’t Push Employees to Change
  3. Job Crafting: Let Your Employees Shape Their Roles
  4. People Work Best When They Feel Good About Themselves: The Southwest Airlines Doctrine
  5. A Rule Followed Blindly Is a Principle Betrayed Quietly

Separate the Job of Creating and Improving

By 1 Comment

You can’t write and edit, engrave and buff, or create and analyze simultaneously. If you try to do so, the editor will hinder the creator’s progress.

Don’t let the evaluator’s biases and entrenched behaviors get in the way of the maker’s creative process. Keep the niggling editor from creeping up during the initial draft.

Idea for Impact: In the early stages, the creator’s mind should be free from any judgment. Revising your way into a cut above is far more effective than trying to conjure brilliance out of thin air.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. How to Banish Your Inner Perfectionist
  2. Five Ways … You Could Stop Procrastinating
  3. Why Doing a Terrible Job First Actually Works
  4. An Effective Question to Help Feel the Success Now
  5. Small Steps, Big Revolutions: The Kaizen Way // Summary of Robert Maurer’s ‘One Small Step Can Change Your Life’

How to … Overcome Your Limiting Beliefs

By Leave a Comment

Your beliefs, rather than your perceived lack of ability, could be the most significant hindrance between your life and the life you want to live. Sadly, self-talk is endless; the more you engage the negative narratives running through your head, the more you’ll abide by them.

Whenever you’re plagued by self-limiting beliefs, gather evidence against them, reframe them, and oppugn them. Scour your brain for real-life examples that debunk the limiting beliefs. For instance, if addressing the self-limiting belief “I am not qualified,” think of as many happenings as possible that you earlier thought you weren’t qualified for—but went on to achieve anyway. These could include being offered a dream job, passing an exam you feared was above your level or showing up when you didn’t think you could.

Idea for Impact: Over time, make a concerted effort to challenge deep-rooted core beliefs by testing them to see if they’re valid. You’ll develop the mental resilience needed to crush the self-limiting beliefs that deter you from reaching your potential.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. What Are You So Afraid Of? // Summary of Susan Jeffers’s ‘Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway’
  2. Nothing Like a Word of Encouragement to Provide a Lift
  3. How to Turn Your Fears into Fuel
  4. How to … Change Your Life When Nothing Seems to be Going Your Way
  5. 5 Reasons Why You Should “Go For It”

Don’t Let the Self-Proclaimed Productivity Pundits Shame You

By Leave a Comment

Productivity advice often relies on shame and condescension, presented as tough love or oversimplified “do as I do” remedies. In a shame-based approach, disorder and confusion are viewed as personal failings, leaving individuals solely to blame.

Most people seek coaches to discard or change certain aspects of themselves. The coach’s role is to help individuals recognize and overcome their fear, self-judgment, and embarrassment.

However, shame is not an effective motivator. Effective coaches instead promote self-compassion and encourage individuals to learn about themselves. This allows them to release the constraints and burdens that have hindered their productivity and prevented them from feeling proud of their achievements.

Idea for Impact: Shame undermines emotional well-being and reinforces negative self-perceptions of being ineffective. Instead, appealing to understanding and self-compassion can lead to significant behavioral breakthroughs.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. The Power of Negative Thinking
  2. Get Everything Out of Your Head
  3. This May Be the Most Potent Cure for Melancholy
  4. Wishful Thinking Is Free. Movement Pays.
  5. The Comfort Zone Isn’t the Problem

Use Friction to Make or Break Habits

By Leave a Comment

It’s human nature to rely more on environmental triggers than we think. As a result, you’re more inclined to achieve a goal if you reduce any possible friction—i.e., eliminate obstacles that could make it harder for you to reach your goal.

One powerful method to tweak your environment to change behavior is the “hit the ground running” mindset. For instance, to start a morning exercise habit, reduce the friction of getting dressed for a workout by sleeping in your workout attire. Put your shoes and socks by the bed. On wintry days, set your jacket on the countertop by your keys.

Idea for Impact: Control your environment; change your habits

Don’t depend on trying to stay motivated to change behavior. Motivation can waver from one minute to the next. Reduce any potential friction in getting stuff done.

Equally, increase the friction for things you should avoid—e.g., break a bad habit by making it more inconvenient.

Wondering what to read next?

  1. An Effective Question to Help Feel the Success Now
  2. What the Dry January Trap Shows Us About Extremes
  3. 5 Minutes to Greater Productivity [Two-Minute Mentor #11]
  4. Do You Really Need More Willpower?
  5. How to Turn Your Procrastination Time into Productive Time