Mixing Business and Personal Life

Mixed messages get mixed results. However, there is an overlap between personal and business worth writing about this close to the New Year.

Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal had an article titled, “How to Keep a Resolution.”

 

No surprise there. Afterall, ‘tis the season for writing about making and keeping resolutions.

 

The article gist is that willpower alone, without planning and retraining to form new successful habits, won’t cut it.

 

In other words, just because you say it’s so, don’t make it so.

 

One of the key contributors to the article was Stanford University marketing professor, Baba Shiv. His specialty is neuroeconomics, the study of the biological basis for making economic decisions.

 

He shares the following:

 

“When the cognitive parts of the brain responsible for decision-making become stressed by other life events, that resolve is likely to succumb to an emotional desire for instant gratification.”

 

The bottom line here is that whether it is personal or business, emotional actions trump logical decisions and good intentions almost every time. 

 
To avoid disappointment (or buyers remorse), address both the emotional and logical.  In business, sell to the emotion by identifying a problem  that exists or could exist, and then demonstrate how you remove that pain or problem while supporting it with logical reason. 

Your personal resolution has the same needs as your business resolution to succeed:

• A detailed plan
• Achievable milestones with emotional rewards
• Anticipate set-backs
• A strategy to manage set-backs

Is there anything new here? Something you don't already know?

 

If you already know about anticipating and planning for set-backs and building emotional rewards into your plan (business, too), probably not.

 

That doesn't mean it isn't worth saying. Especially, if this time, you read it and it sticks.

 

Here's wishing you a happy, productive and profitable new year - whatever that means for you both at home and at work.

Be the hero,
Mark

P.S. If one of your new year's resolutions is to be more productive- to accomplish more in less time so you can enjoy the things in life that make life worth living give me a call.  I have a friend who has developed an effective at home/ at work productivity course based on the work of Crenshaw that is catching on quickly with people looking to make more money but spend less hours in the office and spend more time with family without having work suffer. 

Happy Holidays!
-Mark