Tag: Habits

Planning, goal setting and forming new habits

Linda

The beginning of a new year is a time for many of us to start mapping out our short and long term personal and professional goals.

What do you want to achieve this year?  It might be gaining new customers, aiming for and achieving a new role or maybe working towards more work-life balance.  
So how are you going to get there?

This short article shares some weekly planning tips from entrepreneurs.

A recent study suggests that by using paper, rather than a digital tool makes your planning more effective.  Paper users “developed higher quality plans and fulfilled them at a higher success rate than their counterparts who used mobile phones.”

But should you make a plan or set goals?  This article looks at the difference between plans, goals and resolutions and the pros and cons of each.

Current thinking is focusing on changing behaviour patterns and developing new (and breaking old) habits.


In his book Atomic Habits, author James Clear explains why bad habits are so difficult to break. 

(Clear’s book is in high demand from the Wellington City Libraries collection but it is available in a number of formats).  

A recent NZ Listener article Up and Atom is based on Clear’s work and includes input from Sir John Kirwan.  The advice is that to achieve big results you must first make little changes to your work/life patterns and embed these in your day to day thinking.

Whatever route you chose we have resources to help you set those goals, develop your planning and adopt some new habits to get you on your way.

Atomic habits : tiny changes, remarkable results : an easy & proven way to build good habits & break bad ones / Clear, James
“Atomic habit, noun. Definition: A small habit with big results. People say when you want to change your life, you need to think big: swap job, move house, change partner. But they’re wrong. World-renowned life coach James Clear has discovered a completely different way to revolutionise your behaviour. He knows that lasting change comes from hundreds of tiny decisions – doing two push-ups a day, waking up five minutes early, or holding a single short phone call. He calls these atomic habits. Clear delves deep into cutting-edge psychology to explain why your brain is able to amplify such small changes into such big outcomes. He uncovers a handful of simple life hacks (the forgotten art of Habit Stacking, or the unexpected power of the Two-Minute Rule), to show how you too can grow tiny shifts into life-transforming changes in behaviour. And he reveals a simple four-stage method that will let you build atomic habits into your day-to-day life, starting now. These nuclear changes will have an explosive effect on your career, your relationships and your life.”–Publisher.” (Catalogue)  Also available in Hindi and on EBook Borrowbox , EBook Overdrive , EAudiobook Overdrive

Gearing up : leading your Kiwi business into the future / Kolb, Darl
“Published a decade ago and reprinted multiple times, the authors’ Changing Gears: How to Take Your Kiwi Business from the Kitchen Table to the Board Room was the first book that enabled Kiwi-sized firms to integrate business-school wisdom into their thinking. Gearing Up: Leading Your Kiwi Business into the Future is a completely revised and updated primer for owner-manager New Zealand businesses. The book introduces the business basics that haven’t changed (business models and financial drivers, leadership, team building, strategy and planning), while exploring how globalisation and digital transformations are challenging what we know about doing business. Throughout, the authors focus – through real examples – on the opportunities and challenges faced by the Kiwi men and women running our owner-operated businesses.” (Catalogue)

Also available as an ebook

Planning to win : a guide to business planning & financial modelling / Pender, Gordon
“There are many books on business planning, and many more on management and entrepreneurship. They tell you what their authors think should be included in a plan. Planning to Win is different: it explains exactly how to prepare a business plan it illustrates the elements of a good plan and how they fit together to produce a professional and compelling document. It also includes practical examples: stories from the authors clients that show what happens in the real world. You may need to raise equity capital and/or a bank loan. You may be planning a new venture (if you are very brave). You may want to win a competitive government grant (if you are very patient). You may be planning a joint venture or a new export business. Perhaps you need to show your parents you can take over the family empire and succeed. Or you may want to write the best business plan in your management course or business planning competition. Whatever your situation, one thing is certain: you will understand your business much better if you plan it well. Ultimately, your prosperity is at stake. You are risking your valuable time, your job, perhaps your whole business. Professional business planning will help safeguard your own interests first. If you want to prepare the best business plan and succeed, Planning to Win is for you.” (Catalogue)

Rethinking strategy : how to anticipate the future, slow down change and improve decision making / Tighe, Steve
“Business leaders are desperate for help to position their companies for future success in a climate where business has never been more competitive, volatile or uncertain. Corporate techniques for navigating this complexity have not adjusted to this new dynamic and organisations have suffered an upsurge in strategic surprises proving disruptive to previously successful business models. This book provides an innovative end-to-end process designed to reframe strategy as a resource, and strategic development as the organisation’s principal creative and learning activity, while recognising that strategic creativity is fundamental to successful business transformation.” (Catalogue)

Burn the business plan : what great entrepreneurs really do / Schramm, Carl J
“Carl Schramm, the man described by The Economist as ‘the evangelist of Entrepreneurship’, has written a myth-busting guide packed with tools and techniques to help you get your big idea off the ground. Carl believes that entrepreneurship has been completely misrepresented by the media, business books, University programmes and MBA courses. He believes that the perception of what it takes to start a business no longer matches the reality – which is bad news for everyone because it stops great ideas coming to life. Burn the Business Plan punctures the myth of the cool, tech-savvy 20-something entrepreneur with nothing to lose and venture capital to burn, showing that most people who start businesses are juggling careers and mortgages just like you. Burn the Business Plan is written to encourage you to get started. It demystifies the entrepreneurial process portrayed on television shows like Dragon’s Den. It doesn’t rely on largely irrelevant stories of overvalued tech startups, nor does it build on the largely mistaken narrative of a linear path from cold start to great success that is the essence of business planning, as taught in universities. This is the guide to starting and running a business that will actually work for the rest of us. Burn the Business Plan is for regular people who just want practical, real-world advice on how to start and run a successful business. It shows you how to avoid the common mistakes and what you need to do to put your enterprise on track for success.”– Provided by publisher.” (Catalogue)

Do it for a day : how to make or break any habit in 30 days / Batterson, Mark
“The New York Times bestselling author of Win the Day challenges you to adopt seven powerful habits for thirty days and start your journey toward reaching your God-sized dreams”– Provided by publisher.Destiny is daily habits: our lives our built on our patterns of behavior, both constructive and counterproductive. Batterson believe you are only one habit away from a totally different life! Here he helps you identify changes that are “3M”: measurable, meaningful, and maintainable, and coaches readers step-by-step to change their lives. — adapted from back cover” (Catalogue)

The power of habit : why we do what we do and how to change / Duhigg, Charles
“Charles Duhigg takes us to the edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. With penetrating intelligence and an ability to distill vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives, he brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation.” (Catalogue)

 

Good habits, bad habits : the science of making positive changes that stick / Wood, Wendy
“Wood draws on three decades of original research to explain the fascinating science of how we form habits, and offers the key to unlocking our habitual mind in order to make the changes we seek.” (Catalogue)  Also available on EBook Overdrive and EAudiobook Borrowbox

 

If you need more information please contact the Prosearch team at the library.  We can help you find information across a range of perspectives and resources.  All enquiries are treated in confidence.

5 Good Ways to Construct Habits by guest author Alice Boyes

Linda

5 Good Ways to Construct Habits

Habit formation doesn’t need to feel boring or punishing.

KEY POINTS

  • We have more affinity for developing some habits than others.
  • Research shows that externally-imposed, short deadlines successfully influence our behavior.
  • Studies have found that when our existing habits are disrupted, we’re most apt to build new habits.

Many people are interested in establishing better habits. There are easier and harder ways to do this. We have more affinity for developing some habits than others. When you utilize this knowledge, it can make habit curation easier.

1. Use natural deadlines.

Have you ever tried to construct a “fake” (self-imposed) deadline to get yourself to do something? That rarely works very well.

In contrast, research shows that externally-imposed, short deadlines successfully influence our behavior.

This quirk of human nature can work against us when it leads us to prioritize relatively unimportant tasks with imminent deadlines ahead of more important work that has no or a far way deadline. However, we can also use this phenomenon to serve us. How?

Use natural deadlines to support your habits.

Two examples.

  • I currently have monthly doctor’s appointments. I get labs drawn the day before each appointment. I don’t like having blood drawn, so often I will put this off. However, I want to review the results with the doctor. That motivates me to keep up the habit. The doctor also complimented me on how conscientious I am about it, so now I want to keep up my ‘star pupil’ status!
  • My trash company picks up our trash and recycling on Wednesday mornings. That motivates me to tidy up and fill up the bins on Tuesdays. If I don’t use that space in the bins each week, it’s permanently lost as I can only put out what fits in the bins.

2. Observe when you already do the behavior you’re trying to make a habit.

My latest book, Stress-Free Productivity, is about using self-knowledge to personalize your productivity. Instead of adopting other people’s systems and suggestions, you can reverse-engineer your own. If there is a behavior you do sporadically, identify if there is any pattern to when you do it.

“When” could be related to time (e.g., day of the week, month of the year), or it could be related to circumstance (e.g., when your partner is out of town or when your kids go back to school after vacations).

If you already have a bit of a habit, you can strengthen it, including to built habits of doing behaviors you enjoy more. For example, I like listening to author Gretchen Rubin’s Happier podcast specifically on road trips. But, I don’t always think about doing this or downloading episodes ahead of time if I have poor service.

3. Observe your best windows of self-regulation.

Most of us have windows of time when we’re more focused and on-task than other times. My best windows are Mondays to Wednesdays, from when I wake up until about 1 pm.

Work with your natural rhythms rather than against them. If a habit is critically important, plan to do it within your best windows of self-regulation.

Too often, people plan to do their most important tasks when they’re already exhausted from other work. For example, you think you’ll work on your most important long-term project at 3 pm after you’ve finished all your urgent work to-do’s.

4. Use “resets.”

Research shows that when our existing habits are disrupted, we’re most apt to build new habits. You can engineer this through different types of “resets.” For example, periodically delete all your YouTube or podcast subscriptions, and see which ones you miss.

If you’re even more game, you can do the same with paid memberships, like Costco or Netflix. Periodically cancel all (or some) of them and try a habit reset.

What other ideas do you have for how you could “reset” your current habits and allow new ones to emerge in their place organically?

5. Use natural social regulators.

If you have friends who have good habits you’d like to adopt, then involve yourself in their habits more. For example, if your friend hikes every weekend with their hiking club, then why not join that club?

Advice on habits can feel quite trite after a while. Sometimes it can feel like yet another lecture on how we should all eat better, exercise more, and do more deep work. However, there are more fun and personalized ways you can construct habits.

Originally written for Psychology Today this article has been reproduced with the permission of the author, Dr Alice Boyes.

Alice Boyes, Ph.D., translates principles from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and social psychology into tips people can use in their everyday lives.  Alice grew up in New Zealand and now lives and works in the USA.

Stress-free productivity : a personalized toolkit to become your most efficient and creative self / Boyes, Alice
“From the author of The Anxiety Toolkit, a guide to creating your own personalized productivity plan, using self-science to make systems that work for you”– Provided by publisher.” (Catalogue)
Also available as e-book

 

The healthy mind toolkit : simple strategies to get out of your own way and enjoy your life / Boyes, Alice
“[The author] provides easy, practical solutions that will help you identify how you’re holding yourself back and how to reverse your self-sabotaging behaviors. Blending scientific research with techniques from cognitive behavioral therapy, this … book will take you through the steps to address this overarching problem”–Amazon.com.” (Catalogue)  E-book format only

 

The anxiety toolkit : strategies for fine-tuning your mind and moving past your stuck points / Boyes, Alice
“Drawing on extensive social psychology research, and the author’s training and clinical experience in Cognitive-Behavioral therapy, The Anxiety Toolkit offers actionable strategies that anyone can use to manage their anxiety–both personal and professional. Anxious people often think a great deal about why they think and behave the way they do. They seek self-improvement information yet often get stuck in applying it. They read popular self-help books for anxiety, but these books are highly simplified, to the extent readers can’t make the leap from the examples in the books to their more complex real world problems. They turn to business books because they’re motivated to achieve greater success, but since these books don’t address the reasons anxious people get stuck, they’re not especially helpful. The Anxiety Toolkit provides the information anxious people look for but can’t find. It draws on extensive social psychology research, and the author’s training and clinical experience in Cognitive-Behavioral psychology, addressing the core problems that impede people who are anxious–inhibition, biased thinking, rumination, intolerance of uncertainty, excessive responsibility taking, self-criticism, perfectionism, and avoidance coping–and providing readers with the tools to manage these tendencies”– Provided by publisher.” (Catalogue)
Also available as e-Audiobook