Self-discipline

2018: ‘In fact, blockchain might just be the most over-hyped technology of all time. ‘ Nouriel Roubini Project Syndicate.

Discipline Mentality

Earlier in the book we discussed the power of self-confidence and noted that it was one of the main ingredients that led to success in the famous study of 1,528 gifted children with IQs at the genius level. A second main ingredient that differentiated the successful from the not so successful was discipline. Together, discipline and self-confidence are the foundations of a success mentality. What exactly is a discipline mentality? The best anecdote is the business life of Mary Kay Wagner.

Mary Kay Wagner Ash never finished college. She worked for a variety of direct sales companies, where she rose through the ranks. Rejected for promotion in favor of a young man that she had helped train, she chose to take her destiny into her own hands. At that time she was 45-years old.

She started writing a book designed to help young women navigate through a male-dominated business world. Before she knew it, her unfinished book transformed into a business plan. It was 1963 and the year opened with gloomy forecasts of a downturn (one that never materialized) and cries for tax cuts. In the midst of it all, a month before she started her company, Mary Kay’s second husband died.

Undeterred, she used her entire life savings of $5,000 and recruited the help of her son who eventually became the Mary Kay Inc. Executive Chairman. She hired nine freelance consultants who all worked out of their homes, and then she opened her first store in Dallas. At that time her company was called Beauty by Mary Kay.

In 2014, global revenue exceeded $3 billion, and Mary Kay Cosmetics is a recognized brand all over the world. In her autobiography, The Mary Kay Way, she outlines what it takes for a beauty consultant to succeed and highlights the importance of discipline as a tool for the successful entrepreneur.

She repeats this advice in her two motivational books Mary Kay on People Management (1984) and Mary Kay—You Can Have It All (1995). At length she describes the significance of discipline of mind, and the importance of seemingly simple organizational skills like making lists. She shows validated data on how productivity and profit increase when business people finish their day by writing a “to-do list” for the following day. She also demonstrates the difference in results between consultants that are disciplined in their follow-up procedures, compared to those who are less so.

She says “My lists keep me on track, and I give it all the credit when people tell me how well I follow up. I write down everything on follow-through, and once on paper, it becomes a tangible commitment that I must attend to.”

What Mary Kay described seems simple, and it is. No cutting edge technology is involved. To write lists is hardly a new idea. Most people reading this will readily accept the value of making lists, because they write out grocery and honey-do lists regularly. The same people, however, often fail to take that discipline into their business.

I know several people with their own small businesses who never write anything down. They fool themselves into believing that they can remember everything. The result is late and often incorrect invoices, forgotten orders or promises, missed timelines and frustrated clients. They do quality work, but the overall impression I get as a customer is less than satisfying because I end up having to chase them for forgotten matters.

I know yet others who go to all the trouble of working out complicated quotes, but then forget to follow up in a timely manner with the prospective client. These same people also forget to send invoices for months, by which time I have trouble recalling what it is they are invoicing.

People sometimes confuse discipline with determination. Both are states of mentality, but discipline is also a skill. If your habitual reaction is to write a note to yourself, a reminder, or schedule everything as an obsession then you have the correct mentality. You don’t need fancy devices to do it. The most efficient person I have contracted with this year still uses a paper diary and pen. She never failed to double-check appointments a day before our meeting, or to follow up with an action plan the day after. Consequently I have recommended her to many others.

Discipline is an easy skill to master, and perhaps that is the problem. It is so easy that most people ignore it. A mentality of discipline is essential in your business, and there are two key areas to consider:

Task Discipline

When you think of something that needs doing, and your immediate reaction is to write it on a list, you have task-discipline. If your immediate reaction is to tell yourself you’ll remember it later, you do not have task-discipline, and your business success will suffer.

At the end of every day, write out a to-do list for the next day, and set it to priorities. This will do two things. Firstly, it helps take the stress away from the fear of forgetting something, and you’ll be more relaxed in the evening. Your family will stop complaining about you being so distracted all the time. Secondly, by writing the list you make a subtle commitment to perform the tasks. It is your disciplined commitment to ensure a productive day tomorrow.

• When you enter your workspace the next day, review the list and start the first task immediately. This is an essential discipline. Do not be tempted to check emails, voicemail, or texts first, as they will scatter your focus in a hundred different directions. Get that first task done before you give in to the temptation to do anything else. This is particularly important when we consider the impact of time zones. Many feel they start their day having to play catch up with other zones where the day has already begun. When they enter the office they can have half a day’s communications to respond to. Avoid the temptation to be distracted by that. Get task-one done first. You will find this advice in many biographies and self-help books. It is good advice. It works.

• Depending on your type of business, keep a list of customer or client follow-up tasks. We all have the habit of trying to remember promises we made. Customer satisfaction is your top priority so, whenever you create a need for follow-through, write it on a list and in detail, and then schedule it on a calendar. Every day you should review this “follow-through” list and start checking off the tasks.

• Finish What You Start. We have all experienced checking into a hotel or airport when the person supposedly helping us then takes a phone call in the middle of the process. It is as if a wall is instantly erected between us, and although we can still see the receptionist, we have suddenly become invisible to him. He has not finished what he started before moving onto another task, and the impact is to offend us. When something different calls for our attention, we usually stop what we were doing and turn our attention to the intrusion instead. The habit is exacerbated when we work from home because we can find the isolation or loneliness difficult to deal with. If the phone rings or your email alert interrupts while you are working on your project, avoid the temptation to drop what you are doing in order to answer the phone or read the email. The mind says it is just a quick distraction, but if you respond you can very quickly lose focus on the task you started. When you pick an important task from your “to-do” list, start it and finish it. Don’t allow any interruptions or distractions, no matter how lonely you may feel at that time.

Schedule Discipline

Working out of a home office can be a challenge to keeping a regular schedule. There are so many tempting distractions around, and family and friends love to pop in for a chat. There is the temptation to catch the last innings of an afternoon baseball game, check the stock market, play a video game, or get the news headlines. You can do that after you sell your company for $100 million, but not when it is a start-up.

Kate was someone I knew who started working from home, and then thought it okay to visit her friend down the road once a week for a mid-morning coffee. Soon the once-weekly coffee break became a daily occurrence, and then a half-hour break turned into two hours a day of lost productivity.

At home, you are the time and office manager and the secret to staying disciplined is to schedule absolutely everything, even your meditation time and your coffee breaks, your trips to the gym and the grocery store, and never deviate from the schedule.  

• We live in an age when work finds you wherever and whenever. It is unavoidable, and actually I think it adds healthy variety to a day of work. Because working from a home office can be a lonely experience, however, it is important not to fall into the habit of hanging around in the office waiting for the phone to ring or for an email to arrive. I have always set myself a start time and finish time for the home-office environment. Keep in mind that in pleasant weather I work outdoors on a patio table with excellent wireless connection. Nevertheless, I still keep to a start and end time for that. Otherwise burn out can occur easily. I start work at 9 a.m. and do that first task from my list. At 10:30 I schedule a break and take the dogs for another walk in the woods. It is as good as a power nap for me, and allows me to refresh my mentality. I like to work in 90-minute segments and will typically do the 11-12:30 slot at the desk as well. Lunch is also a 90-minute break that includes a second walk or power nap (I use a hammock in the woods for that and get some great ideas there). I may return to the desk between 2 and 3:30 p.m., but never beyond that. The rest of the day and evening I may occasionally check email and voicemail, but I never return to the desk. I believe such discipline is vital to maintain a success mentality. One thing you must never do is check email or texts just before you go on your scheduled break. It takes practice and discipline to walk away, but do you want to be a success or not? Remember most start-ups fail, and I can guarantee their entrepreneurs work long hours and are checking email constantly from when they get up to when they go to bed.

• To help avoid the temptation to go into the office too early or stay too late, keep a pad and pen with you at all times and wherever you are. I have them beside my bed, in the kitchen and on the coffee table in front of the TV.  I carry them in my coat pockets and the car. When I get a thought or a reminder to do some task, or a simple idea pops into my head, I write it down as soon as it is safe to do so. It stops me sneaking into the office “out of hours.”

• Dress for Work. There is clear scientific evidence that shows people make judgments about others based on what they see. People immediately notice skin color, sex, and age. Within a few seconds, a further judgment about height, hair, and clothes takes place. Depending on what type of company you run, how you dress can have a significant bearing on how much business you get. This should be obvious, but I am frequently surprised by the sloppy appearance of businessmen and businesswomen who visit my home to quote on a work project. Just because you are a plumber does not excuse you dripping someone else’s muck through my house, or shaking my hand with dirty fingers. Just because it is hot does not excuse you turning up in crumpled shorts and vest. Other than opinion and anecdotes, there is no scientific evidence to suggest that how we dress at home affects our performance or productivity. Some people feel they are sharper if they dress well at home. Others think dressing casually increases creativity. One of the great pleasures for me in being my own boss is that I never have to wear a tie.  In fact, I no longer possess a single tie in my wardrobe.

• Keep Out of the Kitchen. Income Opportunities Magazine reported that 36 % of Americans who work from home report that they eat more, and a similar percentage say that they have gained weight. Stay away from the kitchen. I find that having refreshments in my office stops me from falling for the temptation of the refrigerator. If I keep out of the kitchen, I cannot be tempted by food. I am a lover of Chinese teas, so I keep a pot on a warmer on my desk or patio table all the time. It stops me sneaking into the kitchen and then getting distracted by the biscuit barrel.

I asked Julie (a successful freelance consultant who spent most of her working life in a regular office environment before taking the home-based business plunge), about her experiences of schedules:

• One of the biggest challenges is balance between personal time and work schedule – which I will admit I haven’t been able to perfectly achieve. I think there are two general categories of employees: either “self-motivated” or “slackers.”

• If you know yourself to have a tendency toward the “slacker” mentality, I don’t believe there is any point in attempting to work from home. I would say the slackers of the world are better off staying at an office where they’ve got someone playing the role of their “nagging mother” to monitor them and “keep them in line.”

For the “self-motivated” employee, the challenge is to be able to walk away from the work (which is just a room away 24/7). I am happy to work, enjoy working, and treasure the opportunity to do it from home…but at times it truly is hard to stop. Even if I do stop to attend to a personal task, once the task is done I find my mind wandering back to thoughts of work items I want to tend to…right there…in the next room…calling my name. Obviously, I am not some sort of “working-world-meth-addict” on the verge of losing my marriage, friends, and family. I’m just saying that it is a challenge to walk away each night. The traditional office usually provides that time boundary for you. (Self-motivated types should consider themselves warned.)

• Lock the Children in a Closet. No, not really. As a parent, you love your children (I’m thinking pre-teenage here). But work and kids do not go together. I asked Sandy, owner of a virtual-style marketing business how she coped with running a company and having two young children around the place:

Two words: GET HELP! Just as in a traditional office situation, working parents will likely want to obtain some level of childcare for younger children. In my situation, there were early months when my newborn was very manageable while handling the tasks required of me. Additionally, the very flexible schedule I was given allowed me to work at nights (when my child was sleeping) or weekends (when my spouse could care for our child). However, as my child grew in mobility (and increased in vocal ability/volume — usually timed strangely at the same time as any business/conference call), it became obvious I would need at least minimal daycare assistance. In my case, I had someone come to my home to provide daycare. Once there were two children and my schedule became less flexible, I increased the hours with my daycare provider.