In a study of medical students who crammed for three weeks before final exams, it was shown that their cortex (the part of the brain that learns, controls behaviour and helps us to think critically) actually began to shrink. A smaller cortex means less ability to do all the things that make you valuable in work and life and help you achieve your goals.

The student’s brains eventually returned to normal size, but only after four weeks of rest. While some long weekends and a few short breaks here and there help us to recharge in the short term, our long term brain health and our ability to perform requires us to have some longer breaks as well.

Here are some tips for making this more effective:

1)     Get away

If possible, get away. Away from work and away from home. This makes sure that there is no feeling of ‘oh, I really should be doing x’ around the home or home office

2)     Turn off the office

Set up your auto-responder and divert your phone. You might still see your email on your smart phone, but if you’ve set up an auto-reply, then you set the expectation for people that you won’t be getting replying until you are back from holidays.

3)     Spend time slowing down

Don’t go flat out every day on your holiday. Trying to cram things into your holiday can sometimes be as stressful as cramming them into your work day. Make sure you take time every day to stop and slow down. Maybe a long walk on the beach, or an hour reading a book – anything that takes your mind of

Related posts:

1. Unclog Your Brain: re-do your to-do list   Sick of your todo list not getting done? If...
2. Performance Habit #32 – Don’t suppress emotion The worst thing you can do when you are experiencing...
3. Performance Habit #33 – Stress Foods If you have the right inputs, you can create the...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Take a look at your day and see what you complete. What we actually get done during our workday says a lot about where we focus our attention and what priorities we are carrying. The question is: do you like what your day says about you?

Our lives are filled with espoused priorities – the things we say are most important: things like our health, our families, being a good leader, being productive so that we can spend time on the most important things (whether that means work things or other things).

Do this quick exercise: make a list of just four things that are important to you – it can be at work or outside of work – it’s up to you. These should be the top four things that you feel are most important. Now, go back and have a look at your calendar or task list from yesterday (or the last work day). Take a good look at these. How many of these things actually helped you achieve those four ‘most important’ things?

If you’re like most people, this is a little frustrating. Quite often we find, through this exercise, that people spend a good deal of their day doing things that don’t get them closer to their goals. In some cases they do things that actually get them further away. In many cases, we can go the whole day (or whole week) completely neglecting one of those ‘most important’ things.

If you’re one of those people, take these simple steps to rethink the way you work and the things that get your attention:

1. Be clear about what is most important:

Think of the simple question that was asked earlier. What are the four things that are most important to you. If you had to think long and hard about that, then it is no wonder you don’t prioritise those things. When we are clear about what’s most important, then it becomes easier to factor those things into our days and weeks

2. Highlight simple behaviours that get you closer

Try to do something every day that impacts all four of the things on your list. These should be simple things that, when done regularly, will make a big impact in the long term. Don’t wait for opportunities to do huge things that make an enormous difference. Doing smaller things every day will eventually make a big impact.

3. Review every day for two weeks To embed the behaviours and keep you on track, review your most important things every day for two weeks. Answer this simple question for each one: ‘What did I do today that got me closer to …….?’

We all make choices every day about where to focus our time and energy. Sure, there will be things that you simply have to do, but there are always small choices along the way. Make sure you choose behaviours that will have the biggest impact on the most important things.

Related posts:

1. Unclog Your Brain: re-do your to-do list   Sick of your todo list not getting done? If...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

If you are a manager, here’s one of the most nerve-racking things you can do to your staff. Just walk up to them and say ‘How are you going?’

It seems innocuous enough. You might even be genuinely interested in their weekend or their wellbeing. But the reality is that the vast majority of employees think that if you are talking to them, then there’s a problem.

I have dealt with so many organisations, whose staff believe that the only reason management talks to them is when something is wrong. Is this the truth? I am sure it isn’t – I am sure the truth lies somewhere in the middle of what management thinks and what the staff think. Whether this is actually true or not, though, is inconsequential. Their perception is their reality.

The vast majority of staff think: ‘no news is good news’. If no-one’s talking to you, then things must be ok.

Why does this happen?

There are two reasons:

Firstly, leaders in general, don’t talk to their staff enough. And the staff are actually right – they hear more about the bad than the good. If they do a good job, they are doing their job, right? No need for praise when someone just ‘does their job’. But, if they do a bad job, there is a flurry of activity. Now, even if you don’t actually get angry at the team member, there is a still a flurry of activity trying to rectify the situation. Therefore the bad gets more attention than the good.

Secondly, humans are hard-wired to be more sensitive to negatives than positives. This is a throwback to our evolution. As a survival machine, I couldn’t afford to miss a threat – like a predator – but I didn’t see an apple tree, it wasn’t going to kill me. So we learnt to become hypersensitive to negatives.

So, here’s what you need to do:

1) Just talk

This seems like a waste of time to a lot of people, but you would be surprised at how much you find out by just having a normal conversation with someone. They might bring up work or problems they are facing, and that’s ok, but that shouldn’t be your agenda. Your agenda should be learning about your people, and in particular what they like and what motivates them. It’s a chance to build rapport – and we tend to trust people with whom we have a good rappport.

2) Praise the good – a lot

To combat our natural tendency to remember negatives and not positives, we need to make sure that positive feedback outweighs negative. Make a set time each week to go through the team’s accomplishments and give them a verbal pat on the back. Do this without any negatives at all. Save them for another time.

3) Analyse the negatives

When there is some negative feedback to deliver, force your staff to analyse. When we wwitch on the analytical brain, it dulls the noise from our emotional centre. Ask ‘how’ questions – these make us analyse. Avoid ‘why’ questions, because this analysis actually switches the emotional brain on and makes us ruminate.

These are three simple things that you can do to help your people see that management isn’t all about dealing out punishment and bad news. Next time you ask ‘How are you going?’ you might be greeted with a smile rather than fear.

Related posts:

1. Why Meeting Expectations is a Big Deal     How often to you agree to something trivial,...
2. Want performance? Give up control Every manager has at least one person who isn’t hitting...
3. Facebook, People, Productivity, Painkillers A study recently showed that people who were allowed to...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

If you have the right inputs, you can create the right chemicals. You can create calming chemicals like serotonin or damaging, stress chemicals like cortisol.

To fight stress, the fuel we take in is critical. Here’s what we need: antioxidants to fight the damage that stress causes; omega 3 fats to rebuild cells and B-group vitamins to help produce calming chemicals that work in opposition to the stress response.

Antioxidants:

When we are under stress, we produce enormous amounts of energy and our cells (both body and brain) work overtime. This is why stress is exhausting. Just like a car, when we run our cells at high levels, high levels of by-products are also produced and it is these by-products (called free radicals) that eat away at our brain cells (and others) and hurt performance.

Antioxidants neutralise these free radicals. Foods high in antioxidants are coloured fruits and vegetables and berries. Article – 5 Foods Rich in Antioxidants

Omega 3 Fats:

Omega 3 Fats nourish our brains. After we are working overtime with the stress response, we need to repair the cells. We also need to make sure we have enough of the fuel that helps us to build new cell connections (this is learning) and lay down new behaviuors and habits. Omega 3 is that fuel.

Omega 3 Fats are found in some nuts, and fish such as salmon. Article – Best Omega 3 Foods

B-Group Vitamins:

These vitamins provide the inputs from which our calming chemicals are made. Like anything, if you don’t have enough ingredients, you can’t make enough of what you need. B-Group Vitamins, especially B6 and B12 are the ingredients for serotonin and GABA – the calming brain chemicals that help us to switch off the stress response so we can get back to normal.

Milk and milk products are one source of vitamin B. Article – Foods that are high in Vitamin B

Related posts:

1. Performance Habit #32 – Don’t suppress emotion The worst thing you can do when you are experiencing...
2. The Coffee Rules Coffee can be your best friend or worst enemy. If...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

How often to you agree to something trivial, only to forget to actually follow through with it? Well, that trivial thing might have more impact than you think. Research shows that when we set expectations but don’t deliver, it has an enormously negative effect on people’s motivation.

We’ve all done it. We say “yes, sure. I’ll get onto that tomorrow.” And we forget. If you are a leader, then your ability to deliver on these commitments and expectations is paramount if you want your people to do their best work.

The Expectation Effect

Some recent research showed what happens to the dopamine levels inside our brains when we set expectations and if they are delivered. Remember, dopamine is the chemical that signals motivation, reward, makes us feel good, and keeps our attention. In short, it is THE performance chemical.

The researchers measure the level of dopamine in subjects under a number of conditions. When the researchers told people they were going to get a financial reward, the level of dopamine went up dramatically. Later, when those people received their financial reward, the level of dopamine went up again – to exactly the same level.

This shows us that expecting to get a reward is produces the exact same effect on our dopamine levels as actually getting the reward.

But what happened when the reward wasn’t given? In this case, the dopamine levels didn’t only drop back to baseline, nor did they stay the same as previously. When subjects found out that they weren’t ogint to get the expected reward, dopamine levels dropped off the scale. This represents a severe decline in motivation, attention and even problem solving, amongst other performance traits.

A little disappointment goes a long way

Most people think this only works for significant rewards, but it also happens for relatively ‘trivial’ things. Have you ever been waiting to cross the road at a set of lights, maybe you’re in a bit of a hurry, you press the button to get the walk signal and wait patiently. The other direction gets their walk signal and start crossing the road. Surely your turn’s next. The cars start racing through the intersection again for a while, then comes the red light. It should be your turn, but instead, somehow the other crosswalk lights up again and you are left waiting.

The expectation was that it was your turn to cross next. When it didn’t happen, you most likely got really irritated. This is a trivial thing, but it still set that dopamine response into action. If you were really in a hurry, chances are it also elicited some irrational behaviours and thinking.

And so it is with our people. Send that dopamine response on the downslide and you’ll find that they can’t do their best work – they might become irrational and exhibit some behaviours that aren’t productive.

Upholding expectations is a simple process that has very effective results. Stay on top of this if you want your people to do their best work.

Related posts:

1. Facebook, People, Productivity, Painkillers A study recently showed that people who were allowed to...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

The worst thing you can do when you are experiencing high level negative emotions is to try to suppress them.

High-level emotions stop us from doing our best work. Our emotional centre, when switched on, actually causes our rational brain (the prefrontal cortex) to switch off. For some reason, we are hardwired so that these two regions cannot function at the same time. And usually it is the emotional area that gets the attention in these situations.

But the opposite is also true. When we switch on the rational brain, the emotional area starts to dampen down and this is something that most people don’t take full advantage of. Finding a succinct label for the emotion and writing it down seems to switch on the prefrontal area in such a way that it helps to switch off the emotional region.

Students with high levels of performance anxiety performed thirty percent better on exams when they were asked to succinctly describe their emotions (in written form) just prior to sitting the test.

Related posts:

1. Unclog Your Brain: re-do your to-do list   Sick of your todo list not getting done? If...
2. Want performance? Give up control Every manager has at least one person who isn’t hitting...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

We want our people to perform at their best. No doubt about that. Regardless of your personal intentions – whether you want to look good as a manager or you want to make sure your business stays healthy, we all want our people to do their best work.

When people start to underperform, when they start to let us down, our initial impulse is to take back some control. We might decrease some responsibilities, take back some of the project, or micro manage them just a little in order to make ourselves feel more comfortable. This is human nature. We have a goal that is being threatened, so we take back some responsibility.

But how does this impact the person doing the work?

If we look at the way we manage our top performers, versus the way we manage our underperformers, we’d see two completely different management approaches. And while this seems logical on the surface, it seems ludicrous when you dig a little further. I’ll break down the logic:

You do ABC – and someone performs really well.

You have someone that isn’t performing well – and you really want them to do well – so you do XYZ, instead of ABC.

In other words, we manage high performers like high performers. And we manage underachievers like underachievers – even though we want them to be high performers.

That doesn’t sound so logical.

And a big component of this is a feeling of control. When we take control away from people, their ability to think critically, to problem solve and to control emotions and behaviours is compromised. As leaders, we tend to give our high performers a lot of control, and our underachievers less. This might end up being a self-fulfilling cycle.

In a study last year, a group of people were given a problem solving test and their scores were recorded. Each of the participants were then asked to describe a person in their lives that they thought was controlling. For 15 minutes, they were asked to describe the person, their actions and specific situations. After this interview, they were given another (equivalent) problem-solving test and each and every one of them performed about 30% worse.

Just the thought of someone controlling us decreases our ability to problem-solve by 30%!

But it turns out actual control isn’t completely necessary. In many research experiments using computer tasks, just the feeling of control can reignite someone’s performance. As with most things, perception is more important than reality.

So here are some key considerations for giving people the feeling of more control.

1)    Be more organized to delegate

To delegate well and give people control, you have to be more organized than when you simply do it yourself. Give yourself and your direct reports longer lead times, that allow them to get their work done, get some feedback and then redo it it if necessary. When your direct report gets it wrong too close to the deadline, you have very little choice but to take it back and do it yourself

2) Delegate pieces of projects, rather than the whole thing

In doing this, you’re bound to find things that people are proficient at. Remember, the sweet spot for development is at the juncture of challenge and support – too much of either is a poor recipe for learning. Give people pieces of the project that you are happy for them to control, rather than setting them up to fail by asking them to do the entire thing.

3) Create the perception of control

People always need to feel like they control something. There are always things that we have no control over – such as deadlines. But there are also things that we can make sure people do have control over – that might be the way in which the work gets done, the timeline for milestones or even the color of the binding for the final report. These small things can actually make a big difference to the way people perform.

People do their best work when they feel like we trust them and when they have a sense of control. Not when they are operating on fear or worried about making mistakes.

These simple things might just help your underachievers turn their game around.

Related posts:

1. Facebook, People, Productivity, Painkillers A study recently showed that people who were allowed to...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Coffee can be your best friend or worst enemy. If you follow these simple rules, coffee just might help you boost performance.

Let’s get one thing straight. Unless you have a particular intolerance or allergy, coffee is not bad for you. In fact, in recent years coffee has been linked to a decrease in various cancers an increase in longevity, and even weight loss. From a performance standpoint, coffee increases alertness, brain activation and decreases the rate of perceived exertion (that is, things seem easier when we have caffeine on board).

Like most things, coffee can also have detrimental effects – and sometimes it’s the habits associated with coffee that bring you down.

So here are the coffee rules. If you want your daily fix to boost your performance, not make you sick, then follow these.

1) Five is too many

The ‘safe’ amount of caffeine you should consume in one day is generally accepted to be about 300mg.  For argument’s sake, the average espresso has about 100mg (see this article). Two coffees are fine. Three should be fine. If they are only weak (different cafes can be as low as 50mg) then four would just scrape in. But five is definitely too many. This will create ‘caffeine rebound’ and physical dependency

2) Water + Coffee = Clever

Coffee will dehydrate you. Whenever you have a coffee, try to drink at least the same volume of water. This will keep you hydrated and this is a pre-requisite for cells that need to perform (including brain cells)

3) Ditch the sugar

The caffeine is doing the work. Coffee can actually be a great pick me up, especially around that 2-3pm slump. You don’t need a sugar kick as well. It only adds calories and while the coffee is good for you, the processed sugar generally is not. You can end up with a ‘sugar high’ which is inevitably followed by a ‘sugar low’, and by spiking your blood sugar levels like this regularly, you can damage the energy producing structures in your cells, leaving you with less energy in the long term

4) Pull back on milk

Go for skim milk if you can – this will decrease the fat intake and also calories in your day. If you really must, a full-cream coffee once a day isn’t going to kill you. If you drink a really milky coffee, like a latte, then try to roll back to a flat white, which has less milk. If you are trying to lose weight, then ditch the milk altogether – maybe a short macchiato or a long black (again, one milky coffee a day won’t kill you)

5) There’s no such thing as a ‘good’ muffin

Often what makes coffee so bad for you is the treat that you have with it. Ditch the muffin (usually heaped full of sugar and butter) in favour of a healthier snack. Maybe fruit or some avocado on toast. If you must have something kind of sweet, try some fruit toast with just a hint of margarine.

6) What’s your cut-off time?

If you have trouble getting to sleep at night, then you might need to re-think that last coffee of the day. Now, some people can have a cup of Java an hour before bed and be fine. Others will feel the effects of that 4pm cup when it’s time to hit the pillow. Know your cut-off time, and if you really need something, go for peppermint tea as a natural pick-me-up, without the caffeine.

Coffee can be a great booster, social excuse and/or sometimes an excuse to get out of the office for ten minutes. If you follow these rules, then coffee will remain your friend. And not become your enemy.

Related posts:

1. Facebook, People, Productivity, Painkillers A study recently showed that people who were allowed to...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Sick of your todo list not getting done? If you have an overwhelming to do list, it might be doing more than just getting neglected. It mighty actually be hurting your performance in more ways than you realize.

High performance today is about being clever. It’s about working smarter, prioritizing the million things bustling for your attention, finding creative solutions and finding new opportunities to improve.

The part of our brain that is most responsible for this is called the Pre-Frontal Cortex. But while the PFC tends to do this high value thinking, it’s also responsible for some very low level stuff as well.

And here’s the real problem:

This PFC only has a limited fuel supply. If you spend you time and energy doing the low value things, it leaves less fuel for the high value things. This concept of a performance fuel tank is a good analogy. If you have burnt all your fuel – if you’re fatigued, sleep deprived, or have spent an entire day doing high level thing – then you are less able to do things like make decisions, control emotions and behaviours or think critically. That PFC doesn’t function as well.

So what has your to do list got to do with all this?

Well, one of the low value things we do is hold things in short-term memory. Think about when someone gives you a phone number when you’ve got nothing to write on. The process of remembering that number – holding it in short term memory – for two minutes while you find a pad and pen is exhausting, right? Now imagine trying to actually do a problem solving activity while you�re remembering that number? Impossible.

A similar thing happens when you have a long to-do list. Most people spend an abnormal amount of their day trying to remember what they have to do. Thinking about who you can call in the car, wondering what you have to do when you get into the office etc. And all this �recall� burns a lot of cognitive �fuel� � leaving less to do the really important things.

Here are some things you can do to get that to-do list under control:

1) Write everything down � in one place

When you write things down all of a sudden it signals to the PFC that it can stop trying to remember. And you free it up to do some of the more important work. What is most important about this is to make sure that everything is in one place. Most people have a few different places for their tasks � their email inbox, a spiral notebook, their outlook folders � and this only adds to the angst. Now, you don�t just have to remember what you�ve got to do, you�ve got to worry about where everything is and if you�ve overlooked something

2) Think about �Task Categories�, not tasks

The reality is that even if you write things down, you�re going to still try to remember what you have to do when you get to the office. You have to write two reports, return three phone calls and construct five emails. To lighten the load of these things swimming around in your head, try to think in terms of Task Categories. These might include: Business Development, Administration, Report Writing� pick the four to six categories of things that are most important and fill your day. When we think in terms of categories, we can say �when I get to the office I have to do two hours of Business Development� instead of thinking about the ten individual tasks.

This is also handy as our scope of memory is about 4-6 items. At this level, it doesn�t take as much performance fuel to keep them in our head.

3) Park Everything in a time slot

Another way to get things out of your head is to �park� them in a specific time. Have you got two hours free from 12-2pm? Then schedule the tasks that you�ll get done in those two hours. For some reason, parking things is much like doing them. We can rest assured that we have found time to take care of them, so we stop worrying about them � but this only happens when we are specific about what we are going to do and when.

This also has the added benefit of stopping us from having to make decisions about what to do. Usually, when confronted with a decision, we tend to go for the easiest option. When you�ve already planned what you�re going to do, the decision is removed.

Working smarter today is about understanding how we free up resources to do our best thinking more often and for longer. This simple adjustment to managing your task list will create less stress and leave more resources available for you to do your best work.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

that people who were allowed to use Facebook at work were actually more productive than those who weren�t. As astonishing as this sounds there might be some underlying reasons for this that sit at the heart of productivity. So let’s take a look at why his might happen and then what we can learn from it.

There are a number of conditions under which people are more productive and seem to work better. When I say work, I mean the sort of work that characterizes the information age. That is, creative thinking, problem solving and working smarter, not harder.

Being able to access Facebook during work hours helps to satisfy two of these conditions – autonomy and belonging.

Autonomy � having control over our own resources

It has been shown countless times that when people feel a sense of control or autonomy, they are better able to control stress, problem solve and think critically. Control over resources is important. When budgets are micromanaged and heavily prescribed, there isn’t a team in the world that doesn’t say “Heck! Why don’t they just give us the money and let us spend it the way we need to? We know better than anyone how to use the budget to its best effect!”

This holds true for most resources, including time. When we allow people to use their time how they want – without micromanaging or telling them what they can do and when – we might actually see them make better use of their time.

Most employees feel that they are experts at what they do – they do it every day – so they know how to best use their time. But is Facebook-ing the best use of time? If they’re using it to disconnect and recharge for a moment before working at high intensity again, then it could well be.

Belonging � Facebook feeds social connectedness

Social support and feeling connected to people is a major contributor to productivity. When people have a feeling of social support and connectedness, they are better able to handle stress and a decrease in stress leads to an increase in productivity. Take for example people who are about to undergo surgery. When people are merely able to hold the hand of someone they care about, the stress reaction (characterized by heart rate, blood pressure and the level of stress hormones) decreases dramatically.

Connecting with people with whom we feel safe also has a positive effect on problem solving and creativity. Simply conversing with other people helps provide a different perspective on a problem and can often be the seed that creates a new solution. This happens even when we’re not talking about the specific problem in question – in fact sometimes that works even more effectively.

But won’t people abuse the privilege?

Sure some people will. But most people are pretty reasonable. In many situations where people are given control of a precious resource, they tend to treat it fairly responsibly. In one particular study, they compared patients with chronic pain and divided them into two groups. One group had to call a nurse to administer their painkillers, while the other group was able to self-administer their drugs. Contrary to expectations, the patients who were allowed to self-medicate used less of the drug. Amazingly, they also reported feeling less pain. Might this be another by-product of a feeling of autonomy?

So, what can we learn from this?

Well, the real lesson is that if we can create a feeling of autonomy and belonging then we get more productive people. Facebook might be just one example of this.

But the other lesson is this: we often make rules for the sake of those people who might offend. We make blanket rules because we think that one or two people might do the wrong thing if we give them a chance. Start making rules that satisfy the people who will do the right thing – and then manage the people that don’t.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.