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The best agencies understood the importance of routines. The worst agencies were headed by people who never thought about it, and then wondered why no one followed their orders.

Charles Duhigg

The more you focus, the more that focus becomes a habit.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Focus Habit Yourself
Once you understand that habits can change, you have the freedom and the responsibility to remake them. Once you understand that habits can be rebuilt, the power of habit becomes easier to grasp and the only option left is to get to work.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Easy Freedom Habit Option Understand Yourself
Companies aren’t families. They’re battlefields in a civil war.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Civil Company Family War
It is facile to imply that smoking, alcoholism, overeating, or other ingrained patters can be upended without real effort. Genuine change requires work and self-understanding of the cravings driving behaviours.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Alcohol Behaviour Change Drive Effort Reality Smoking Understand
If you believe you can change – if you make it a habit – the change becomes real.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Believe Change Habit Reality Yourself
If you dress a new something in old habits, it’s easier for the public to accept it.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Acceptance Habit Public Yourself
Making your bed every morning is correlated with better productivity, a greater sense of well-being, and stronger skills at sticking with a budget.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Bed Better Budget Morning Production Strong
Self-discipline has a bigger effect on academic performance than does intellectual talent.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Anand Thakur
Change might not be fast and it isn’t always easy. But with time and effort, almost any habit can be reshaped.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Change Easy Effort Fast Shape Time
The best agencies understood the importance of routines. The worst agencies were headed by people who never thought about it, and then wondered why no one followed their orders.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Agency Follow Order People Routine Understand Wonder
Simply giving employees a sense of agency- a feeling that they are in control, that they have genuine decision-making authority – can radically increase how much energy and focus they bring to their jobs.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Agency Authority Decision Employee Energy Job Simplicity
Cravings are what drive habits. And figuring out how to spark a craving makes creating a new habit easier.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Anand Thakur
If you want to do something that requires willpower – like going for a run after work – you have to conserve your willpower muscle during the day.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Conservation Day Run Willpower Work
Rather, to change a habit, you must keep the old cue, and deliver the old reward, but insert a new routine.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Change Habit Old Reward Routine
When people have a willpower failure, it’s because they haven’t anticipated a situation that’s going to come along.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Failure People Situation Willpower Yourself
Research suggests that investment bankers are more prone to commit fraud when they feel the competitor at their heels.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Commitment Competition Heel Investment Research
I think I’m smart, and I know I was a good mom. But there wasn’t a lot I could point to and say, that’s why I’m special.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Goodness Known Myself Smart Special Thinking
There’s a natural instinct embedded in friendship, a sympathy that makes us willing to fight for someone we like when they are treated unjustly.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Fight Friendship Natural Sympathy Treat
Small wins are a steady application of a small advantage.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Advantage Application Small Win
America is the Saudi Arabia of coal.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Coal Country Power
At some point, if you’re changing a really deep-seated behavior, you’re going to have a moment of weakness.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Behavior Change Moments Point Weakness
The cooperation of NASCAR – or any other system, it turns out – persists only when everyone believes he has the opportunity to win.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Believe Cooperation Himself Opportunity System Win
Since the 17th century, insurance agents have been the foremost experts on risk.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Agent Expert Insurance Risk
Most of the choices we make each day may feel like the products of well-considered decision making, but they’re not. They’re habits.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Choice Day Feeling Habit Product
The Golden Rule of Habit Change: You can’t extinguish a bad habit, you can only change it.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Bad Change Gold Habit Yourself
The problem is that your brain can’t tell the difference between bad and good habits, and so if you have a bad one, it’s always lurking there, waiting for the right cues and rewards.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Brain Difference Oneself Problem Reward Yourself
Willpower isn’t just a skill. It’s a muscle, like the muscles in your arms or legs, and it gets tired as it works harder, so there’s less power left over for other things.
CHARLES DUHIGG

Hard Work Power Skill Tired Willpower

The best agencies understood the importance of routines. The worst agencies were headed by people who never thought about it, and then wondered why no one followed their orders.

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The best agencies understood the importance of routines. The worst agencies were headed by people who never thought about it, and then wondered why no one followed their orders.

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Popular Authors

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