Which daily business habits do you have? Driving to work the same way? Parking in the same spot? Having a cup of coffee as soon as you get to work? Checking your emails as soon as they arrive?  Having the same meeting at the same time every day?

These are probably, until now, actions that you had not recognised as habits, but you can see that you do them habitually.

Research tells us that without even realising it, most of what we do every day is habitual – we do the same things in the same order at roughly the same time – EVERY DAY.

One study even suggests that for some of us this is 90% of the day – this means that we are on auto-pilot – going through the motions for 90% of the day!!

Doing the same things in the same way every day will bring the same results…

And if you want to achieve more for you or your firm its essential to identify the habits that are holding you back and to change them.

Let’s change tack for a minute…

To make real habit change work in your accountancy firm, perhaps practice on changing a personal habit first.

There are only 5 signs, 5 triggers, 5 cues you must be aware of to get the habit change and the results you want.

When you recognise these 5 triggers you can control your actions, change your habits and improve your results.

For example – change the way you brush your teeth…

All 5 triggers are at play:

• Same location – your bathroom
• Same time – first thing in the morning
• Same people – just you
• Same preceding action – putting the toothpaste on the brush
• Same emotional state – tired – just got up

Change a trigger and see what happens…

Put the toothpaste on in a different location, change the direction you brush your teeth, brush them with someone else, brush them for a minute longer…

Then translate this to a business habit – again keep it simple to start with – remember with each habit change we get better at changing habits.

You could start by making ‘planning your day’ a habit - even if you freewheel from job to job – this is a good habit you can develop.

The most productive people have a plan for each day, a list or diary time scheduled for everything they plan to do that day.

Less productive people rush from job to job, moving from the phone, to emails and then other urgent matters…

Which one are you?​