5 Tips to Maximize Your Daily Productivity Leveraging an IRON Mindset
I often get asked about the traits and characteristics of high performers in sports and the workplace, and my answers tend to surprise folks. High performers have a strong work ethic, are highly committed, and are tough. Yet, these traits tend to be prerequisites for success rather than what separates the best from the rest. The very best always display a massive ability to adapt to changing situations, are highly moldable in times of high stress, and can navigate through failure and adversity without losing passion or belief. In other words:
When shit hits the fan, and it always will, the best are ready to absorb, respond, and adapt.
The three words I land on are antifragile, moldable, and changeable. These are traits to master and should be viewed as long-term personal and team goals. The key for you is to have a pathway to develop these characteristics. By embracing this pathway, one immediate outcome will be an enhanced capacity to handle stressful situations and a vastly improved profile of stable daily energy.
Today’s piece consists of laying out the pathway to drive daily performance:
Case Study: Team-wide Habits to Improve Productivity
Zach, one of my long-time coached athletes, is a department lead for a major tech company. He recently found himself going through a firestorm of high demand and challenge for his whole team. The work demands were endless and dominated all aspects of life, leaving little room for downtime, positive habits in health, or any social interaction outside of work. Within a few weeks, he and his whole team were fried. They still worked hard, but their individual and collective effectiveness was plummeting. You can’t fool physiology. This story is a prime example of hard work in the absence of recovery, leading to a drop in effectiveness. Something had to change.
Zach reacted to the heavy workload by simply buckling down and getting on with the mountain of tasks. Unfortunately, situations like these require more than just work ethic. It is necessary to foster a team-wide culture that builds physical and mental capacity to create sustainable work performance – even in those times when ‘shit hits the fan.’. While certain situations will occasionally require long hours and a singular focus, there eventually must be a transition to more sustainable practices that can be maintained over weeks and months.
In Zach’s situation, we tackled the task from an individual level. After all, we put our oxygen masks on first before helping others. Zach was genuinely putting in eighteen-hour days for a few weeks early on. It was a hurricane of work, and he had shelved his habits around health. This lifestyle is not sustainable. I asked Zach if he felt he had completed all the work required at the end of every day. Of course, the answer was a firm no. It was an uphill battle to prevent serious negative consequences. There is always more to do, so I asked him to be brave. Aim to nail fifteen hours of work a day for the coming weeks (yes, only 15!), but reintroduce some simple daily habits that promote rejuvenation, health, and energy. These included ‘micro workouts’ of twenty minutes in the morning, a walk after dinner every night, essential habits in eating and hydration, sleep, and some non-negotiable time for kids and family. I also asked him to take a half-day each week completely off from working. It took bravery, but Zach followed along, with a high dose of accountability and support from me, texting each morning and night with quick updates.
It was an extreme few months, and Zach implementing the bare minimum into his schedule did not result in optimal health or life balance, but it allowed him to be productive. The key habits increased his capacity to absorb the high-stress load and improved his effectiveness during working hours. While he was still in a firestorm at work, he felt in control.
As a good leader, Zach immediately implemented team education and practices that fostered similar principles, including ensuring his team had a full day off every two weeks and half a day each week. As a team, they began supporting each other in positive habits and checking in to ensure that each member moved their body and checked out from work to get enough sleep each night.
The positive approach was infectious. And, counter to conventional wisdom, adding the responsibilities of exercise, sleep, and eating habits into the team’s hurricane of work, was a recipe for getting more done.
Five Habits to Boost Daily Energy
Our case study highlights an extreme and short-term situation for Zach to navigate, but we can apply the lessons to daily work performance. Many folks think that performance optimization is reserved for elite athletes, but I believe we are all athletes, even if we are not training for any races. Therefore, we label endurance athletes' application of training techniques to workplace success The IRON MINDSET.
Your success in achieving improved health, daily energy, and performance in work is contingent on a sustainable and consistent training (exercise) program supported by simple daily habits. The tips below will improve daily energy, posture, and body composition. Additionally, they will help you better deal with changing times and stressful situations:
Consistent Movement and Training
Exercise is random, but organize the activity and movement into a schedule, and it becomes training. Every human benefits from this organization so that it can fit in life and be that much more effective. A small amount of consistent training goes a long way towards building fitness and improving mental health. For example, I had Zach embrace 15-20 minute sessions every morning, with activities he enjoys and has easy access to. Then, an end-of-day activity, such as a post-dinner walk, is highly beneficial. There is no need to overthink the work – keep it short, low intensity, and soul-filling without screens and structure. Go in simply with the mission to cycle blood through the body and brain, offering a ‘dishwasher’ effect to the mind.
Post-Workout Fueling
When exercising, especially in the morning, post-workout caloric intake is critically important to your performance for the rest of the day. Not only will consuming calories shortly after your workout boost recovery, but it will also reduce the stress hormones that rise with exercise (cortisol). Another critical factor in your post-training fueling is avoiding athletic starvation. Portion control and food choice later in the day are challenging if you fail to properly fuel following a workout. Not only do you get very hungry, but the body will crave quick-fix calories like fast food. Avoid this and set yourself up for success by consuming protein and carbohydrates after every workout.
Skip the Sugars and Starchy Carbs
If you succeed in post-workout fueling, the rest of your daily eating should be focused on nutrient-rich foods. Incorporate plenty of protein, vegetables, and healthy fats, with minimal consumption of sugars and starchy carbohydrates. Reducing evening carbohydrates outside of vegetables is an excellent approach if you are seeking body composition improvements. Further, breakfast should become your most important and unmissable meal of the day, even if consumed post-AM workout. Set yourself up for success with a full breakfast, then manage your carbs (I didn't say eliminate) for the rest of the day.
Fill Your Soul
Your nighttime sleep is your most powerful recovery tool. You should commit to a consistent rhythm of positive sleep habits in an appropriate environment (cool and dark). With this said, if the opportunity allows, aim to sneak energy-enhancing recovery into the day. Even a few minutes of downtime without electronics is beneficial. If you get the chance for a 10-15 minute break to rest or be calm, your productivity will improve for several hours following. The workplace demands high focus, and you should integrate breaks into the day to depressurize the accumulation of physical and mental stress. If it suits you, meditation can be a powerful tool to develop and build mental capacity in high-stress situations.
Stay Thirsty
Daily hydration is non-negotiable. Dehydration leads to sleepiness, lethargy, and misidentified hunger cues. Sip water throughout the day, embracing frequent toilet breaks to re-energize and move the body.
Oh, and while I’m here, let’s add a unique ‘Tip from Matt’ to help with the afternoon slump:
Manage Your Core Body Temp
Those afternoon energy dips are not just because you are overworked or underslept. They may be due to a natural drop in your core temperature. As a part of your circadian rhythm, the body cools in the middle of the afternoon. So you don't need a coffee or Red Bull. Instead, simply grab some caffeine-free hot tea or hot water with lemon. It will perk you up for hours and won’t disrupt your sleep.
Implementing the Habits
Knowledge of the power of these practices is one thing, but application to daily life is on you. While it might feel like you are climbing a never-ending mountain, I promise that your effectiveness as a leader and capacity to process information and focus throughout the day will accelerate if you adopt these simple practices.
I would argue these traits are central to being an effective leader. You do not need to look like an athlete, train for an event, or live a monastic lifestyle. You simply have to show up and embrace a commitment to self-improvement. Guess what? The way to inspire others is not to be perfect but to show them you are constantly striving to improve. This is why some of the most influential leaders I know are folks who have never seen themselves as athletes. For example, I coached a wonderful woman named Marina, who couldn’t walk up a flight of stairs when I first met her. Yet, she committed, met herself at her current place of ability, and adopted an IRON MINDSET. Over the following year, she lost 100 pounds, transitioned to regular structured exercise, faced her fear of water, learned to swim, and in doing so, inspired her whole team. She is still nowhere near the fastest competitor, but she is a leader and an inspiration.
The secret to success was the transparency of her commitment, being open about her challenges, and being vulnerable enough to show her performance. That's true leadership. She was 100% authentic in her voice as she walked the walk. Improvement and commitment are infectious.
The second, and equally important part, is to foster an environment that provides space for your team to implement these habits in their life and create work practices that actively encourage self-improvement. There is no value in a leader adopting an IRON MINDSET and the associated habits while driving the team forward in a structure that allows no capacity for them to embrace a parallel journey.
At Purple Patch, we often highlight that no one cares who is fast or slow, but instead that everyone is simply trying to improve. The performance journey is a natural environment to create a level playing field among the team. If you dare to create enough space for people to take breaks, occasionally step away from trying to drive forward, consistently exercise or train, and support positive habits in sleeping and eating, you will have a more engaged, connected, and higher performing team.
Done right, this will create a powerful sense of belonging, foster community, and encourage individual and collective wellbeing. In addition, this IRON MINDSET leads to improved performance and the ability to stick together and navigate periods of high stress.
Get energetic and share your journey. Your work performance will thank you, and so will your friends and family.
Cheers,
M