Set external deadlines
Saturday Night Live has been on the air since 1975. Lorne Michaels is the show’s creator, and when asked about the magic behind SNL his response was, “We don’t go on because we’re ready. We go on because it’s 11:30.” There is something incredibly powerful about external deadlines, and they are far more powerful than […]
Your job is to make people care
We each have a passion that we pour our heart and soul into. And when we show this passion to the world, we hope that it’s received with a similar enthusiasm. But nobody cares as much as you do. And that’s a good thing. It means your job isn’t about making the best version of […]
You can’t out-train a poor diet
The single biggest factor in maintaining a healthy lifestyle is your diet. This is because it’s super easy to consume calories, and really hard to burn them. As an example, let’s say a muffin has 300 calories. To burn off that single muffin, you could do one of these exercises: Jump rope for 22 minutes […]
The free pass
I’ve been told I haven’t written about ice cream for a while. So in this post I’ll use ice cream to illustrate the “free pass”. Typically when you want to make a change in life, the first step is owning that you want to make a change. This can be a big first step for […]
Getting in a taxi after live TV
When I worked in funds management, I was a guest panellist on live television. It was a memorable moment for me – not because of the experience itself, but what happened after. Entering the studio for the live session was everything you would expect. The bright lights, the buzz of activity, the careful coordination of […]
Improving cost-benefit analysis
You may already be familiar with cost-benefit analysis when making decisions, but I’d like to unpack a key part of this process you may not have appreciated. Simply put, cost-benefit analysis is weighing up the costs and the benefits of an action. If the benefits outweigh the costs, we’ll act. If costs outweigh the benefits, […]
Serving your time
When you are working in a role or with an organisation, do you feel you need to stay for a particular period of time? If so, I’d encourage you to challenge this assumption. It’s natural to assume that we should “serve our time” in a position before moving on. The problem though is this assumption […]
Go all in
Dedication is required to achieve meaningful things, but we don’t want to stick to something for too long if it’s not working, and we don’t want to stop too soon before we experience exponential benefits. That’s why I like to look at life in 5-year windows. I find this amount of time nicely balances a […]
The power of choice
Our 20s can feel hard because of all the choices we need to make. But it can feel harder when we aren’t given (or feel like we aren’t given) a choice at all. People need a sense of agency over their lives. We need to feel like we are in control, and this comes through […]
Skinny milk please, with extra sugar
Every coffee order is different, but it’s interesting hearing those that are contradictory. “One latte please with skinny milk, extra sugar”. We all do it. Adding sugar-free coke to full-sugar rum. Spreading cholesterol-reducing margarine on bread, before jam. Buying heart-smart mince and garlic bread. Are we trying to be more good or less bad? The […]