Habits And Success

Article on habits and success

While browsing in LinkedIn, influencer Charles Duhigg's blurb/summary 'Writer at New Yorker' caught my attention. I clicked on his name and quickly browsed his profile.

He is the author of two books published by Random House, one on habits. What a coincidence, I thought. I prepared a research proposal on electronic monitoring of employees to ensure the employees develop and maintain the habit of washing their hands, which is a requirement for their jobs (link to my signature assignment on Employee Monitoring & Performance.

I wanted to know more about his Power of Habit so I looked up his book on Amazon.com. Turns out that he believes understanding how habits work is essential to success - attaining success at losing weight (exercising regularly to lose weight) and being successful at work (being more productive). He believes we must build/maintain good habits and lose the bad ones. I got the impression that it is all about habits. To be successful in life, one must manage habits well.

I did work on factors of success and did not consider habits. But habits may be related to one of my 7Ps, perseverance.

It is interesting that some habits are required (such as the habit of washing hands / hand hygiene discussed in my proposal). Some habits need to be developed (such as the habit of going to the gym to exercise). Right now, I need to develop the habit of going to the gym so I will look into habits further. One of the questions I thought of is: Could technology be used (by electronic monitoring or other means) to both develop good habits and drop bad habits?

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By: Fahmeena Odetta Moore, PhD Student, Researcher who researches success.