Choosing Sacred Habits
I often reflect on the importance of successful people choosing and executing sacred habits. But how do we choose? And, what habits can make the biggest difference? Here are a five that work quite well in adding to organizational efficiency:
Habit #1 - Identify outcomes for tomorrow, today-
Outcomes are NOT tasks. Outcomes speak to the results you are seeking. At the end of your day, identify specific outcomes you want for tomorrow. For example, preparing an agenda for tomorrow’s meeting is a task you might need to execute. Running a team meeting where teammates feel inspired and empowered while innovating together on an important project is a deliverable. Get clear about your outcomes the day before, and your brain will work on that task, even in the back of your mind, until the time arrives. This habit will help shape your mind and allow you to be more ready than ever for what’s next.
Habit #2 - Adopt a mobile capture system-
One of the stressors that keeps leaders and peak performers from optimal creativity and pace is the constant worry about forgetting or overlooking something. In virtually every time management or efficiency protocol, there is a system of content capture. What this means is that you have a system for tracking info as it comes to you, and simply capturing it. Remember an item for your grocery list? Remember to send an e-mail to your boss? Get an idea for fixing your project? Each of these items can be simply captured on a ONE digital note (or paper note) that you carry with you all day, thus remaining mobile. Your mobile capture must go where your brain goes, unless perhaps you’re in the shower. Don’t categorize what you remember, or what you are given or told throughout the day or try to be perfect. Just grab it and add it to your list. At the end of the day, you’ll have a list, and then you can figure out what to do with it then. This habit quite simply gives spillover ideas a place to land every time.
Habit #3 - Gamify the mundane-
Mundane tasks should be chunked together, and scheduled at a time of the day when energy is perhaps at medium or low. Peak performers who are morning people will often set aside a block of time in the late afternoon to execute the mundane, recognizing that their best thinking may not be needed. Secondly, setting a timer and moving to beat the clock and executing otherwise boring tasks gives a nod to the necessary momentum in using time to more effectively execute. And it's fun!
Habit #4 - Unitask—don’t multitask-
Multitasking has been shown to be summarily ineffective in terms of a thinking tool. Simply put, every division of your attention minimizes the power going to what your brain is focusing on. Organize your day so that you can unitask, as often as possible, focusing on one point of focus at a time. Writing an important memo may only take you 20 minutes if you can totally focus on that task and refrain from responding to pop ups, text messages, and any other distractions. Safeguard your brain and try to unitask or focus on one thing at a time with great concentration and most of the work you have to do will simply get done with greater efficiency and effectiveness.
Habit #5 - Set the Time and Move-
Your physiology was not designed to stare at a plastic rectangle all day long. Anthropologists believe that we were made to move between 7 and 15 miles per day in gathering what we need for food, shelter, etc. For busy professionals who can very easily ignore our basic instincts, set the timer every 55 minutes at a minimum and get up and move. If you're working from home, can you get up from your computer and spend 5 minutes on the elliptical or the treadmill? Even at a modest pace you could probably go almost half a mile. By getting up and moving and putting in the steps, you're taking care of yourself physically and you're also engaging the part of your brain that was designed to problem solve while you move. Simply put, your brain works better and you solve problems more effectively if you do so while you're moving. Start now! Move my friend!!!