Chapter 2

Nine Things Successful People Do Differently

by Heidi Grant Halvorson

Why have you been so successful in reaching some of your goals, but not others? If you aren’t sure, you’re far from alone. Even brilliant, highly accomplished people are pretty lousy when it comes to understanding why they succeed or fail. The intuitive answer—that you’re born predisposed to certain talents and lacking in others–is really just one small piece of the puzzle. In fact, decades of research on achievement suggest that successful people reach their personal and professional goals not simply because of who they are, but more often because of what they do.

What follows are the nine things that successful people do—the strategies they use to set and pursue goals (sometimes without consciously realizing it) that have the biggest impact on performance.

1. Get Specific

When you set a goal, be as specific as possible. “Lose five pounds” is a better goal than “lose some weight,” because it gives you a clear idea of what success looks like. Knowing exactly what you want to achieve keeps you motivated until you get there. Also, consider the specific actions you’ll need to take to reach your goal. Promising you’ll “eat less” or “sleep more” is too vague. “I’ll be in bed by 10 PM on weeknights” leaves no doubt about what you need to do, and whether or not you’ve actually done it.

Spelling out exactly what you want to achieve removes the possibility of settling for less—of telling yourself that what you’ve done is “good enough.” It also makes your course of action clearer.

Instead of “getting ahead at work,” make your goal more concrete, such as “a pay raise of at least $ ____” or “a promotion to at least the ____ level.”

To be successful, you also need to get specific about the obstacles you may encounter. In fact, what you really need to do is go back and forth, thinking about the success you want to achieve and the steps it will take to get there. This strategy is called mental contrasting, and it’s a remarkably effective way to set goals and strengthen your commitment.

To use the mental contrasting technique, first imagine how you’ll feel attaining your goal. Picture it as vividly as you can—really consider the details. Next, think about the obstacles in your way. For instance, if you wanted to get a better, higher-paying job, you would start by imagining the sense of pride and excitement you would feel accepting a lucrative offer at a top firm. Then you would think about what stands between you and that offer—namely, all the other really outstanding candidates. Kind of makes you want to polish up your résumé a bit, doesn’t it?

That’s called experiencing the necessity to act; it’s a state that’s critical for reaching your goal, because it gets the psychological wheels in motion. Mental contrasting turns wishes and desires into reality by bringing attention and clarity to what you will need to do to make them happen.

2. Seize the Moment to Act on Your Goals

Given how busy most of us are and how many things we’re juggling at once, it’s not surprising that we routinely miss opportunities to act on a goal. Did you really have no time to work out today? No chance at any point to return that phone call?

To seize the moment, decide when and where you’ll take action, in advance. Be specific (“If it’s Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, I’ll work out for thirty minutes before work”). Studies show that this if-then planning helps your brain to detect and take advantage of the opportunity when it arises, increasing your chances of success by roughly 300 percent. (For more on planning when and where you’ll perform tasks, see “How to Tackle Your To-Do List,” later in this guide.)

Deciding in advance when and where you will take specific actions to reach your goal (or how you will address obstacles you might encounter) is probably the most effective single thing you can do to ensure your success.

If-then plans take the form:

If X happens, then I will do Y.

For example:

If I’m getting too distracted by colleagues, then I’ll stick to a five-minute chat limit and return to work.

Why are these plans so effective? Because they’re written in the language of your brain—the language of contingencies. Humans are particularly good at encoding and remembering information in “if X, then Y” terms, and using these contingencies to guide their behavior, often below their level of awareness.

Once you’ve formulated your if-then plan, your unconscious brain will start scanning the environment, searching for the situation in the “if” part of your plan. This enables you to seize the critical moment (“Oh, it’s 4 PM! I’d better return those calls!”), even when you’re busy doing other things.

Since you’ve already decided exactly what you need to do, you can execute the plan without having to consciously think about it.

3. Know Exactly How Far You Have Left to Go

Achieving any goal also requires honest and regular monitoring of your progress—if not by others, then by you yourself. If you don’t know how well you’re doing, you can’t adjust your behavior or your strategies accordingly. Check your progress frequently—weekly, or even daily, depending on the goal.

Feedback helps motivate us because we subconsciously tune in to the presence of a discrepancy between where we are now and where we want to be. When your brain detects a discrepancy, it reacts by throwing resources at it: attention, effort, deeper processing of information, and willpower.

If self-monitoring and seeking out feedback are so important, you may be wondering why we don’t always do it. The first and most obvious reason is that it’s effortful; you need to stop whatever else you’re doing and really focus on assessment. And of course, the news isn’t always positive; sometimes we avoid checking in on our progress because we don’t want to acknowledge how little progress we’ve made. Self-monitoring requires a lot of willpower, but you can make it easier by using if-then planning to schedule your self-assessments.

Done the right way, assessing your progress will keep you motivated from start to finish. Done the wrong way, it may actually lower your motivation. Recent research by University of Chicago psychologists Minjung Koo and Ayelet Fishbach examined how people pursuing goals were affected by focusing on either how far they had already come (to-date thinking) or what was left to be accomplished (to-go thinking).

Koo and Fishbach’s studies consistently show that when we’re pursuing a goal and consider how far we’ve already come, we feel a premature sense of accomplishment and begin to slack off.

When we focus on progress made, we’re also more likely to try to achieve a sense of “balance” by making progress on other important goals. As a result, we wind up with lots of pots on the stove, but nothing is ever ready to eat.

If, instead, we focus on how far we have left to go (to-go thinking), motivation is not only sustained, it’s heightened. So when you’re assessing your progress, stay focused on the goal and never congratulate yourself too much on a job half-done. Save it for a job well—and completely—done.

4. Be a Realistic Optimist

When you’re setting a goal, by all means engage in positive thinking about how likely you are to achieve it. Believing in your ability to succeed is enormously helpful for creating and sustaining your motivation. But don’t underestimate the time, planning, effort, and persistence it will take to reach your goal. Thinking things will come to you easily and effortlessly leaves you ill prepared for the journey ahead and can significantly increase the odds of failure.

This is the difference between being a realistic optimist and an unrealistic optimist.

Realistic optimists believe they will succeed, but also believe they have to make success happen—through things like planning, persistence, and choosing the right strategies. They recognize the need for considering how they’ll deal with obstacles.

Unrealistic optimists, on the other hand, believe that success will happen to them—that the universe will reward them for their positive thinking.

Cultivate your realistic optimism by combining a positive attitude with an honest assessment of the challenges that await you. Don’t just visualize success; visualize the steps you will take in order to make success happen. If your first strategy doesn’t work, what’s plan B? (This is another great time to use your if-then plans.) Remember, it’s not “negative” to think about the problems you are likely to face—it’s foolish not to.

5. Focus on Getting Better, Rather Than Being Good

Believing you have the ability to reach your goals is important, but so is believing you can get the ability. Many of us believe that our intelligence, personality, and physical aptitudes are fixed—that no matter what we do, we won’t improve. As a result, we focus on goals that are all about proving ourselves, rather than developing and acquiring new skills.

Fortunately, abilities of all kinds are profoundly malleable. Embracing the fact that you can change will allow you to make better choices and reach your fullest potential. People whose goals are about getting better, rather than being good, take difficulty in stride and appreciate the journey as much as the destination.

How can you motivate yourself to approach new responsibilities with confidence and energy? The answer is simple, though perhaps a little surprising: give yourself permission to screw up.

I know this may not be something you’re thrilled to hear, because you’re probably thinking, if you screw up you’ll be the one to pay for it. But you needn’t worry, because when people feel they’re allowed to make mistakes, they’re significantly less likely to actually make them!

People approach any task with one of two types of goals: what I call be-good goals, where the focus is on proving that you have a lot of ability and already know what you’re doing, and get-better goals, where the focus is on developing ability and learning to master a new skill.

The problem with be-good goals is that they tend to backfire when we’re faced with something unfamiliar or difficult. We quickly start feeling that we don’t actually know what we’re doing, that we lack ability—and this creates a lot of anxiety. And nothing interferes with performance quite like anxiety does; it is the productivity killer.

Get-better goals, on the other hand, are practically bulletproof. When we think about what we’re doing in terms of learning and mastering—accepting that we may make some mistakes along the way—we stay motivated despite setbacks that might occur.

A focus on getting better also enhances the experience of working; we naturally find what we do more interesting and enjoyable when we think about it in terms of progress, rather than perfection. Finding what you do interesting and believing it has inherent value is one of the most effective ways to stay motivated despite unexpected roadblocks. In fact, interest doesn’t just keep you going despite fatigue; it actually replenishes your energy.

6. Have Grit

Grit is a willingness to commit to long-term goals and to persist in the face of difficulty. Gritty people obtain more education in their lifetimes and earn higher college GPAs. Grit predicts which cadets will stick out their first grueling year at West Point. In fact, grit even predicts how far contestants at the Scripps National Spelling Bee will go.

The good news is that if you aren’t particularly gritty now, you can do something about it. People who lack grit often believe that they just don’t have the innate abilities successful people have. If that describes your own thinking, you’re wrong. As I mentioned earlier, effort, planning, persistence, and good strategies are what it really takes to succeed. Embracing this knowledge will not only help you see yourself and your goals more accurately, but also do wonders for your grit.

Study after study of successful people, whether they are athletes, musicians, or mathematicians, shows that the key to success and enhanced ability is deliberate practice—thousands of hours spent mastering the necessary skills and knowledge.

Grit is all about not giving up in the face of difficulty, even when you’re tired or discouraged. And the best predictor of not giving up is how we explain that difficulty in the first place. When you’re having a hard time, what do you blame?

Entity theorists, who are convinced that ability is fixed, tend to blame setbacks on a lack of ability. If this is hard for me, I must not be good at it. As a result, they lack grit; they give up on themselves way too soon, inadvertently reinforcing their misconception that they can’t improve.

Incremental theorists, on the other hand, tend to blame setbacks on more controllable factors—insufficient effort, using the wrong strategy, poor planning. When faced with difficulty, they try harder, armed with the belief that improvement is always possible. This gritty attitude leads to far greater long-term accomplishments.

Change really is always possible, and the science here is crystal clear. There is no ability that can’t be developed with experience. The next time you find yourself thinking, “But I’m just not good at this,” remember: You’re just not good at it yet.

7. Build Your Willpower Muscle

Our self-control “muscle” is just like others in your body; when it doesn’t get much exercise, it becomes weaker over time. But when you give it regular workouts, it will grow stronger and help you reach your goals.

To build willpower, take on a challenge that requires you to do something you’d rather not do. Give up high-fat snacks, do a hundred sit-ups a day, try to learn a new skill. When you find yourself wanting to give in or give up—don’t. Start with just one activity and make a plan for how you’ll deal with troubles when they occur (“If I want a snack, I’ll eat one piece of fresh or three pieces of dried fruit”). It will be hard in the beginning, but it will get easier, and that’s the whole point. As your strength grows, you can take on more challenges and step up your self-control workout.

Like biceps or triceps, willpower can vary in its strength, not only from person to person, but from moment to moment.

The good news is that willpower depletion is only temporary. Give your muscle time to bounce back, and you’ll be back in fighting form. When rest is not an option, you can accelerate your recovery simply by thinking about people you know who have a lot of self-control.

Or, you can try giving yourself a pick-me-up. Anything that lifts your spirits—listening to a favorite song, calling a good friend, or reflecting on a past success—should also help restore your self-control when you’re looking for a quick fix.

8. Don’t Tempt Fate

No matter how strong your willpower muscle becomes, it’s important to always respect the fact that it’s limited, and if you overtax it, you will temporarily run out of steam. Don’t try to take on two challenging goals at once, if you can help it (like quitting smoking and dieting). And make achieving your goal easier by keeping yourself out of harm’s way. Many people are overly confident in their ability to resist temptation, and as a result they put themselves in situations where temptations abound. Successful people know not to make reaching a goal harder than it already is.

Resisting temptation is a key part of successfully reaching just about any goal. What we want to do is often the very opposite of what we need to do. This may sound a bit counterintuitive, but the very first thing you’re going to want to do if you’re serious about resisting temptation is make peace with the fact that your willpower is limited.

Even if you’ve built up large reserves of willpower, you won’t have much left for sticking to your resolutions at the end of a long day of putting out fires at work. That’s why it’s so important to give some thought to when you’re most likely to feel drained and vulnerable and make an if-then plan to keep yourself out of harm’s way.

It’s far easier to abstain from doing something all together than it is to give in just a little and then stop. And you need more and more self-control to stop a behavior the longer it goes on. If you don’t want to eat the entire slice of cake, don’t take “just one bite.”

9. Focus on What You Will Do, Not What You Won’t Do

Do you want to get promoted, quit smoking, or put a lid on your bad temper? Then plan how you’ll replace counterproductive behaviors with more constructive ones. Too often, people concentrate all their efforts on what they want to stop doing and fail to consider how they will fill the void. Trying to avoid a thought can make it more active in your mind (“Don’t think about white bears!”). The same holds true when it comes to behavior; by trying not to do something, you strengthen rather than diminish the impulse.

If you want to change your ways, ask yourself, “What will I do instead?” For example, if you’re trying to gain control of your temper, you might make a plan such as, “If I’m starting to feel angry, then I’ll take three deep breaths to calm down.” By using deep breathing as a replacement for giving in to your anger, your success-sabotaging impulse will get worn away over time until it disappears completely.

Once you’ve decided to make an if-then plan to help you reach your goal, the next thing you need to do is figure out how to construct it.

There are three types of if-then plans:

• “Replacement” if-then plans do just what the name suggests—replace a negative behavior with a more positive one (as in the anger management strategy just described).
• “Ignore” if-then plans are focused on blocking out unwanted feelings, like cravings, performance anxiety, or self-doubts. (“If I have the urge to smoke, then I’ll ignore it.”)
• Finally, “negation” if-then plans involve spelling out the actions you won’t be taking in the future. With these plans, if there is a behavior you want to avoid, you simply plan not to perform this behavior. (“If I am at the mall, then I won’t buy anything.”)

Of all three types, replacement plans are most successful. When it comes to reaching your goals, focusing on what you will do, not what you won’t do, is the most effective way to achieve them.

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Heidi Grant Halvorson, PhD, is a motivational psychologist and author of the HBR Single Nine Things Successful People Do Differently (Harvard Business Press, 2011) and the book Succeed: How We Can Reach Our Goals (Hudson Street Press, 2011). Her personal blog, The Science of Success, can be found at http://www.heidigranthalvorson.com/.

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Excerpted with permission from Nine Things Successful People Do Differently (product #11065).