I am trying to improve my response flexibility. I came across this phrase last year and it has really stuck in my mind. Response flexibility is about creating a gap between a trigger and the response to that trigger – allowing you to make a conscious decision about who you respond. “Between stimulus and response...
Despite existing for 2500 years or so, mindfulness has been gaining popularity in recent years. One of the reasons for this is the large body of evidence – both anecdotally and scientifically – of the benefits that practicing mindfulness can bring (the key word here is “practicing” by the way). I only discovered mindfulness about...
I am fascinated by cognitive biases and heuristics which are part of the growing field of behavioral econonomics. I’ve written about a cognitive bias known as “The Dunning-Krueger effect” before, but today I’d like to discuss one that I see quite often at work – the “status quo bias”. The status quo bias occurs when...
I have been using to-do lists to plan my days for more than 25 years and am pretty confident that my productivity would be cut in half without them. But I also use my to-do lists for more than just tasks that I need to accomplish for the day. One of the great features of...
We live in an instant gratification world. Many of the millennials that I know expect to have all the same “trappings of life” that their parents spent several decades to acquire.. now. We are bombarded with images of success, talent, and athleticism. We see musicians with no more natural ability than ourselves playing in front...
A couple of my employees were invited to speak at the local university recently to discuss their jobs and their career choices with students. They asked me if I had any advice for them that they could share; they may have regretted that question after 45 minutes of my response. You see, there seems to...
“Meanwhile” is a great word for helping you (and others) focus on action. Use it as a reminder that although one path may be blocked, there's usually something else that you can be accomplished. It also reminds you that not everything stops while you are waiting, or procrastinating with or without good reason. For example:...
A well-documented, common trait of highly successful people is a strong “sense of urgency”. An atmosphere of urgency creates an atmosphere of achievement – as they say. This is not the same as being stressed out and hectic. A sense of urgency is about respect – respect for your own time, respect for the time...
One of my employees recently told me that he had 2750 emails in his inbox. I couldn’t believe it, no wonder he had problems keeping on top of tasks and felt “overwhelmed” at times at work. Keeping emails in your inbox longer than they “need” to be there is the equivalent of having papers spread...
I posted last July that I like to listen to AudioBooks and how the iPhone Audible apps is oh so spectacular. My preference is to listen to non-fiction books – business, personal development, etc – and read fiction. One of the reasons for this is that non-fiction can be delivered in a scientific or somewhat...