How to Have a Good Day: Harness the Power of Behavioral Science to Transform Your Working Life

by Caroline Webb

SETTING GREAT GOALS Take a moment now to think about your priorities for today. Set some behavioral goals. Personally, what behavior of yours will support your intentions for the day? Specifically, what tangible actions can you plan to take? Put these on your to-do list along with your regular tasks. Articulate your goals for the win. Phrase them so that they’re positive, meaningful, feasible, and situation-specific. • Create “approach” goals. Make sure your goals are about doing desirable things, or doing more of them, rather than avoiding bad things happening. If they’re negative in tone, turn them around. • Find a personal why. Can you articulate why the goal matters to you or how it will benefit something you care about? • Break off bite-sized chunks. If the actions to take are unclear, break your goal down into smaller, bite-sized chunks. Get especially clear on the very first step to take to make progress. • Make a “when-then” plan. Define clear situational prompts (“when X happens, then I will do Y”) to increase the chances that you’ll get your most important goals met today. Create a brain-friendly to-do list. Whichever approach you take to task management, make sure you don’t overload your brain’s working memory and that you feed your reward system.