Even my brain can be more efficient….

Today’s blog is inspired by a few things that are going on “At the Whiteboard” this week:

1. We have a new client (dance, dance, dance!) that we are delivering our Whiteboard University Curriculum to. We are working on the change management piece to inspire the staff members to make new habits in their work, that will become routines, and effectively change the culture.
2. I was recently given a Lumosity subscription. Lumosity is a website with brain games that stimulate the brain dramatically, changing and remodeling itself to become more efficient and effective in processing information, paying attention, remembering, thinking creatively, and solving problems.
3. I’m reading the most brilliant book, The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. It talks about how once you develop certain habits, it takes your brain less effort to perform them and how the use of habits, routines, cues, and rewards can be invaluable in transforming an organization. It is a fantastic and interesting read, and I highly recommend it.

Now my brain needs a workout too?

These seemingly independent items in my life seemed to collide and beat me over the head with the same message.

Make processes a routine or habit, making your brain more efficient and ready to perform more value added tasks (Click to Tweet).

It’s so easy to be overwhelmed with large changes in our lives – both those active changes that we ourselves decide to commence (moving, getting married, having children), and the passive ones that are imposed on us (office reorganization, new legislation, new political environment). Do you ever feel that everything is happening at once? Too many changes? Are the changes overwhelming and it seems that you’ll never be in a normal state again?

See how these 3 tips can help you make effective change, add brain value, and just be BETTER! (You know our tagline by now… Better. Faster. Cheaper)

Exercising your Brain makes you ZEN!

1. When implementing large scale organizational (or family or personal changes) think about changing small key habits of every person involved. Its the consummation of all those small new routines and habits that make a change work large scale!
2. Exercise your brain and improve your memory, response time, and problem solving skills and make your brain more efficient. When change or unexpected things happen, you’ll be ready to adapt better and have less stress. For example, I’m terrible at doing simple arithmetic fast in my head. And its stressful when I make an error calculating a tip or estimating a percentage. So I practice my arithmetic skills on Lumosity. Once I’ve exercised my brain to respond better and more accurately, I can do this without the stress of failure and focus my brain effort on other more important things!
3. Make things that can be a chore or something you talk yourself out of, habits and routines in your life (i.e. eating well, working out, reading the paper every day). Once they become a habit, its way less effort to have the internal dialogue in your brain, and allows you to focus your efforts on the complex work or life issues that really add VALUE.

Tell us what habits, routine, change, and exercising your brain mean in your day-to-day activities, we’d love to hear them. Email us at info@whiteboardconsulting.ca/staging or tweet us @whiteboardcons using #betterfastercheaper.

Until next week….
Nicole