Habits that prevent you from working and developing your business, and how to overcome them
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2024 4:45 am
With the arrival of a new year, we traditionally want to change something in our lives for the better. We try to get rid of bad habits, increase our productivity and achieve new goals. But not everyone succeeds. The reasons are different, and one of them is habits that we most often do not notice, says former Google designer and co-author of the book "Find Time: How to Focus on What Matters" Jake Knapp.
We analyzed his ideas, studied the results of various studies, and compiled a list of the main habits that are harming your productivity.
Content
1. Constantly "sitting" on your smartphone
This habit is familiar to everyone, but few people realize its impact on their lives. And it is huge. A study conducted in the United States shows that, on average, Americans look at their smartphones up to 262 times a day, that is, every 5.5 minutes.
46% of respondents admitted that they spend more time with their mobile phone than with their significant other. 40% look at their smartphone while driving and 47% do not get distracted from their device even during dates or friendly get-togethers.
The smartphone also interferes with work. It turns out that most people do not part with the gadget either during work meetings or during lunch breaks. Many also put the phone next to the computer, as a result of which they are constantly distracted by every new message or notification from applications, thereby disrupting their concentration on work.
2. Make decisions on autopilot
We have many habits that we follow automatically, without thinking. This negatively affects productivity and distracts us from important things.
An example of such a habit is regularly checking work email or chats. We all do it, and it’s normal. Such a habit becomes bad when it becomes automatic and too frequent. If you check your work email or chat every half hour or hour, if you rush to answer every letter, firstly, it distracts you from other tasks. Secondly, it sends a signal to your colleagues that you are ready to drop everything to process someone else’s request and take on more work.
Jake Knapp admits in his book Find Time: his iPhone became his autopilot habit. He would “hang out” on it even during the hours he was planning to spend with his family. His epiphany came when his son asked him, “Why are you looking at your phone for so long?” while they were hanging out together on a weekend. Knapp says he couldn’t answer at the time because he really didn’t have any particular reason to look at his iPhone. It was just a habit.
Psychologist Kelly McGonigal in her book "Willpower: How to Develop and Strengthen It" notes: there are certain psychological factors that motivate us to repeat certain actions every day. Having understood their causes, it will be easier to get rid of those habits that you consider negative for yourself.
Kelly cites her student Michelle as an example. She literally “lived” in her email: she looked at it on the way to and from work, during lunch and family walks. Attempts to limit herself did not help. Then Michelle began to observe herself to understand why and when the desire to check her email appeared. The reason turned out to be anxiety. Michelle noticed that she reached for the “box” every time she experienced stress and nervous tension. Reading emails for her was a way to get rid of stress, and not a work necessity, as she had long thought.
3. Distract yourself with non-work tasks that “certainly won’t take much time”
Imagine: you sit down to work, diligently complete a task. Then someone calls you, asks for advice, a hint, and you spend the next few hours not on your work task, but on solving another problem. One that, as it seemed at first, would take only a couple of minutes. Then it's time for lunch, then you need to answer a couple more emails, and as a result, the day goes by, and the work is almost not done.
This is the real problem. Tasks that you think will only take a minute end up dragging down a lot of other things and distracting you even more from your core work.
What to do with all this?
Jake Knapp and his colleague John Zaretsky have developed their own formula for efficiency. It consists of four stages and looks like this:
The first stage is choosing the Main Thing, that ivory coast phone number library is, the most important task (or tasks) for the day. You need to determine what to do during the day and what it is reasonable to spend the bulk of your time on.
The second stage is maintaining high concentration on your chosen top tasks. You need to maintain laser-like focus, and the authors of Make Time offer a number of tactics to help you do this. For example:
— Delete social apps (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.) from your smartphone. And if you’re brave enough, your browser and email too. They all eat up your time, and you don’t even notice. Knapp himself says he’s been living with a smartphone cleared of social apps for over 6 years. If you need such apps for work, return them to your phone and then delete them again.
— Turn off notifications. The less your phone tells you about new videos, podcasts, and news, the less you’ll need to pick up your phone and the less often you’ll be distracted.
— Temporarily get rid of gadgets. Try to do without your laptop and phone at least once a week. It’s inconvenient to quickly respond to messages and keep track of the latest news, but you’ll have time to do what’s important, not what’s most likely to grab your attention.
— Set deadlines or targeted work sprints. Set yourself a specific amount of time (say, three days) to achieve important results and try to devote this entire period to work. Avoid mindless multitasking.
— Read the news once a week. According to Knapp and Zoretsky, most people only need to read a weekly news digest to stay informed about important events. Reading news sources every day is more likely to ruin your mood and eat up a lot of time, but it will not give you anything else.
The third stage in the formula of Jake Knapp and John Zaretsky is energy. The idea is simple: you need to eat right and do physical activity. Both improve your well-being and charge you with energy. And without energy, it will be harder for the brain to cope with work tasks. In short, if you want to work better and more effectively, take care of your body.
The fourth stage is reflection. The essence of it is to regularly analyze your own results: what has been done, what has not been done, why, and how you can improve your current achievements. This is important because it helps you visualize your entire work process and better understand whether you are getting closer to your goal or not.
We analyzed his ideas, studied the results of various studies, and compiled a list of the main habits that are harming your productivity.
Content
1. Constantly "sitting" on your smartphone
This habit is familiar to everyone, but few people realize its impact on their lives. And it is huge. A study conducted in the United States shows that, on average, Americans look at their smartphones up to 262 times a day, that is, every 5.5 minutes.
46% of respondents admitted that they spend more time with their mobile phone than with their significant other. 40% look at their smartphone while driving and 47% do not get distracted from their device even during dates or friendly get-togethers.
The smartphone also interferes with work. It turns out that most people do not part with the gadget either during work meetings or during lunch breaks. Many also put the phone next to the computer, as a result of which they are constantly distracted by every new message or notification from applications, thereby disrupting their concentration on work.
2. Make decisions on autopilot
We have many habits that we follow automatically, without thinking. This negatively affects productivity and distracts us from important things.
An example of such a habit is regularly checking work email or chats. We all do it, and it’s normal. Such a habit becomes bad when it becomes automatic and too frequent. If you check your work email or chat every half hour or hour, if you rush to answer every letter, firstly, it distracts you from other tasks. Secondly, it sends a signal to your colleagues that you are ready to drop everything to process someone else’s request and take on more work.
Jake Knapp admits in his book Find Time: his iPhone became his autopilot habit. He would “hang out” on it even during the hours he was planning to spend with his family. His epiphany came when his son asked him, “Why are you looking at your phone for so long?” while they were hanging out together on a weekend. Knapp says he couldn’t answer at the time because he really didn’t have any particular reason to look at his iPhone. It was just a habit.
Psychologist Kelly McGonigal in her book "Willpower: How to Develop and Strengthen It" notes: there are certain psychological factors that motivate us to repeat certain actions every day. Having understood their causes, it will be easier to get rid of those habits that you consider negative for yourself.
Kelly cites her student Michelle as an example. She literally “lived” in her email: she looked at it on the way to and from work, during lunch and family walks. Attempts to limit herself did not help. Then Michelle began to observe herself to understand why and when the desire to check her email appeared. The reason turned out to be anxiety. Michelle noticed that she reached for the “box” every time she experienced stress and nervous tension. Reading emails for her was a way to get rid of stress, and not a work necessity, as she had long thought.
3. Distract yourself with non-work tasks that “certainly won’t take much time”
Imagine: you sit down to work, diligently complete a task. Then someone calls you, asks for advice, a hint, and you spend the next few hours not on your work task, but on solving another problem. One that, as it seemed at first, would take only a couple of minutes. Then it's time for lunch, then you need to answer a couple more emails, and as a result, the day goes by, and the work is almost not done.
This is the real problem. Tasks that you think will only take a minute end up dragging down a lot of other things and distracting you even more from your core work.
What to do with all this?
Jake Knapp and his colleague John Zaretsky have developed their own formula for efficiency. It consists of four stages and looks like this:
The first stage is choosing the Main Thing, that ivory coast phone number library is, the most important task (or tasks) for the day. You need to determine what to do during the day and what it is reasonable to spend the bulk of your time on.
The second stage is maintaining high concentration on your chosen top tasks. You need to maintain laser-like focus, and the authors of Make Time offer a number of tactics to help you do this. For example:
— Delete social apps (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.) from your smartphone. And if you’re brave enough, your browser and email too. They all eat up your time, and you don’t even notice. Knapp himself says he’s been living with a smartphone cleared of social apps for over 6 years. If you need such apps for work, return them to your phone and then delete them again.
— Turn off notifications. The less your phone tells you about new videos, podcasts, and news, the less you’ll need to pick up your phone and the less often you’ll be distracted.
— Temporarily get rid of gadgets. Try to do without your laptop and phone at least once a week. It’s inconvenient to quickly respond to messages and keep track of the latest news, but you’ll have time to do what’s important, not what’s most likely to grab your attention.
— Set deadlines or targeted work sprints. Set yourself a specific amount of time (say, three days) to achieve important results and try to devote this entire period to work. Avoid mindless multitasking.
— Read the news once a week. According to Knapp and Zoretsky, most people only need to read a weekly news digest to stay informed about important events. Reading news sources every day is more likely to ruin your mood and eat up a lot of time, but it will not give you anything else.
The third stage in the formula of Jake Knapp and John Zaretsky is energy. The idea is simple: you need to eat right and do physical activity. Both improve your well-being and charge you with energy. And without energy, it will be harder for the brain to cope with work tasks. In short, if you want to work better and more effectively, take care of your body.
The fourth stage is reflection. The essence of it is to regularly analyze your own results: what has been done, what has not been done, why, and how you can improve your current achievements. This is important because it helps you visualize your entire work process and better understand whether you are getting closer to your goal or not.