executive education
DEPT
you would like to bring about. In order to
change your behavior, you have to make
sure that you develop goals that can lead to
success.
The most important part of setting your
goals is to focus on positive goals. A positive
goal is an action you can perform rather
than an action you want to avoid. For example, if you are concerned about multitasking at work, you might want to set the goal
to stop checking your email so often.
The problem with negative goals like
this is that the system that learns habits
cannot learn not to perform an action. It can
only learn to do things. Consequently, it is
crucial to focus on behaviors you perform.
Instead of a negative goal like avoiding
multitasking, it is better to focus on positive
steps you can take like closing your email
program when you have difficult work to
do, or leaving your cell phone off when you
are at a meeting.
Tame the Go System
The positive goals you develop then have
to engage your motivational system. At the
core of your motivational system is a set of
brain mechanisms that give energy to your
goals. These brain mechanisms, called the
Go System, are very efficient at helping you
achieve your goals. Engaging a goal with
your Go System leads you to focus your attention on information in your environment
that relates to achieving that goal. It also
creates that nagging feeling (that we sometimes call a craving) when we are not currently working toward achieving that goal.
A big problem with engaging the Go
System with new goals is that the goals that
are most likely to be energized are those that
are specific. A goal like “stop multitasking”
is problematic, not just because it is negative, but also because it is too general. What
actual actions can you perform that would
lead to the outcome that you were not multitasking?
Instead of thinking only about general
desirable outcomes, you need to create specific plans that will lead to the outcome you
desire. That means creating a specific plan.
This plan has to include particular actions
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as well as the times that you will perform
those actions. You cannot say that you will
shut off your email program for an hour
each day, because that time is not specific
enough. Instead, you need to decide which
hour and then mark it on your agenda. Better still, choose a consistent time each day
(say from 9:30-10:30am). This consistency is
important, because the easiest way to learn
a new habit is to create a consistent relationship between the environment and a desired
behavior.
Harness the Stop System
Every once in a while your old habits resurface. In those moments, your Go System
has been engaged by the behavior you were
hoping to stop. The last defense you have
once the Go System has been engaged by
something you don’t want to do is another
set of brain mechanisms that are designed to
shut off behaviors that Go System engaged.
This brain mechanism is the Stop System.
Unfortunately, the Stop System is not
nearly as Y