Bad habits in the workplace are devastating to relationships, productivity, reputations and ultimately jobs. But bad habits are hard to break. According to a new survey, 98% of people who make an effort to break a bad habit fail. The reason: They rely on one “magic bullet” solution.

Why One Strategy Isn’t Enough to Break a Bad Habit

Bad habits are typically caused by multiple factors. Accordingly, ridding yourself of them requires multiple strategies. Specifically, experts say there are six influence strategies, or sources, that drive human behavior. The more of these strategies you can influence, the more likely you are to achieve real change. Thus, individuals who use four or more influence strategies are four times more likely to succeed in breaking a bad habit.

1. Tap into Values

Make your intended change a “moral imperative.” Create a short description of the values your bad habit puts at risk and the values you’ll realize by breaking it. Commit this description to memory and use it as a source of motivation when the going gets tough.

2. Build New Skills

Changing habits often requires not just resisting impulses but developing new skills such as through coaching or training.

3. Influence the Influencers

Most bad habits are enabled by others. You need to change relationships that foster bad habits to build and support new habits. For example, if an employee is often late to team meetings, enlist his supervisor’s support to get him to arrive on time.

4. Hold Yourself Accountable

Let people you trust and admire know of your determination to break the bad habit. This will help build social support and even a bit of social pressure. Regularly report your progress to the support group and ask group members to hold you accountable for results.

5. Lower Costs and Add Rewards

Be sure your change strategies are affordable and sustainable or you won’t be able to see them through. Use small incentives to jump start change.

6. Enlist the Environment

Behavior is influenced by the physical environment such as the buildings and things surrounding us. Smart influencers design the environment to enable new behaviors, and by doing so, create an influence strategy that works every time.

Conclusion

To sum up, breaking a bad habit isn’t something you can do with just a single strategy. It requires a combination of efforts along up to six different fronts. The more of the six you can affect, the better your chances of achieving real change in habits and behavior.

Wishing you career success!

Lauryn Franzoni
ExecuNet
www.execunet.com

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