Most of us don’t fail because of a lack of talent, ambition, or intelligence. It’s often because we develop small habits that impact our productivity, relationships, reputation, and well-being. Because these behaviors become automatic, we often don’t recognize the toll they take on our energy, happiness, and career success. What feels normal, harmless, or is entirely invisible can slowly impede our ability to do our best work.
Identify The Work Habits That Are Holding You Back And Plan To Replace
The good news is that habits can be changed. And you don’t need a complete life overhaul to get results.Often, a few small changes to your daily routines will dramatically improve your focus, resilience, relationships, and happiness at work. The first step in eliminating any bad habit is identifying it. Consider these eight common bad work habits and identify the ones that may be holding you back. Eliminating even just one or two of them can have a profound impact on your success and job satisfaction.
1. Focusing Too Much on Small Problems/Not Seeing the Big Picture
Things go wrong every day. Often, many times a day. Yet most of these issues are insignificant in the context of your organization’s larger mission. But because they’re happening in real time, we give them a lot more importance than they deserve. The key to remaining resilient and motivated is to remind yourself of the big picture, the ultimate goal, the endgame. When you’re able to simultaneously be present in the task at hand and focused on the big goal, you’re able to weather challenges, correct the course, overcome setbacks, and move forward.
2. Gossiping
Gossiping at work may feel harmless. Sometimes, it even creates a sense of connection. But it usually comes with costs that outweigh the short-term benefits. Gossip shifts your focus from solving problems toward criticizing people. Over time, it can create an atmosphere of suspicion, cliques, and unnecessary work drama. Teams perform best when everyone feels psychologically safe. A culture that supports gossip can make employees hesitant to share ideas, take risks, or even ask for help. One principle from The Optimist Creed offers a powerful antidote to this bad habit: Give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others. Follow this simple rule at work: Talk to people, not about them.
3. Reopening the Same Work Again and Again
Every time you reopen an email, document, or task, you spend mental energy reacquainting yourself with it. Touching the same item multiple times creates inefficiency and slows progress. Don’t let curiosity lure you into opening something you’re not prepared to address. If you aren’t ready to take action, don’t engage. To break this habit, think of the Buckeye State. The Ohio Principle (Only Handle It Once) is a productivity technique where you complete a task immediately upon encountering it. This simple practice reduces backlog, mental clutter, and wasted effort. When you put the OHIO Rule into action, you’ll feel more energized and productive.
4. Multitasking in Virtual Meetings
Multitasking is a myth. It’s a term coined to describe what computers do when they’re executing multiple tasks simultaneously. Attempting to multitask increases cortisol and adrenaline, leading to mental exhaustion and poor work quality. Rather than giving you a productivity boost, multitasking reduces your productivity by up to 40%. When you multitask in meetings, you detract from your personal brand, telling people that you just don’t care about the meeting or are too important to stay engaged. As hard as it is, during your next meeting, commit to staying engaged. Eliminate distractions and commit to being fully present. Close the other windows on your device, turn off entry chimes, and remove other potential distractions. Then be present and contribute throughout the meeting, even when it’s not your turn to present. Remember: meetings aren’t interruptions to your work. They are opportunities to build trust, relationships, and your personal brand.
5. Ending the Day Reading Email
If the last thing you do before you close your eyes for the night is read your email, you’re are setting yourself up for a bad night’s sleep. Instead, do something to calm your mind. Establish a no-screen rule approximately 30 to 60 minutes before bedtime. Then, engage in something that’s relaxing and has nothing to do with work. Consider deep breathing, reading, listening to calming music, stretching, drinking some chamomile tea, or meditating.
6. Starting the Day Reading Email
You just had a great night’s sleep thanks to your new Calm Your Mind routine. Don’t ruin the Zen by instantly reaching for your phone, making email the first thing you do in the morning. When you check your email first thing, you’re starting your day reactively rather than proactively. Instead, focus on what’s most important to you. When you let others define your agenda right after waking up, you reduce the impact of your high-energy, creative morning hours. Consider taking a walk, doing some stretching or deep breathing, or deciding the three most important activities for your day. Adding an optimistic mantra to your kick-off routine can set the tone for the entire day.
7. Seeking a Dopamine Rush
We’re rewiring our brains in a really bad way. Our desire for a quick dopamine rush makes us check our email incessantly or look at our latest LinkedIn post to see how many likes it got. This chronic distraction is called task switching and it creates a huge cognitive load. That’s both unproductive and exhausting. Instead of giving into the temptation to check email, Slack, LinkedIn, or news feeds whenever the urge strikes, establish specific times to do so. You still enjoy the reward, but on your terms rather than your impulses. In addition, disable all nonessential notifications to reclaim your attention. Every ping, vibration, and pop-up is an invitation to abandon what you’re focused on.
8. Complaining
When you complain, you rewire your brain, and not in a good way. Complaining releases the stress hormones. It reinforces negative thinking patterns and can affect both your mood and your health. You also become your organization’s Doug or Debbie Downer, not the person people seek out to spend time with. To stop complaining, focus five times as much on the positive as you do on the negative, and work to eliminate tolerations that frustrate you the most to help reduce some of the triggers for complaining.
