Get Over The Mid-Week Hump
As I was sitting at my desk today, a very serendipitous email popped up, notifying me that a member of our head office team had posted a comment on the online forum we use for internal communications. It was so timely because it was all about the epidemic that strikes the workforce at this exact time of the week – ‘Wednesday-itis’.
You’ve probably all heard of ‘Monday-itis’, but might not have been aware (at least not consciously) of this particular silent productivity killer, one which lurks halfway between consecutive weekends – sapping productivity and draining that most vital of an organization’s profitable juices – motivation.
This particular team member’s post was all about motivation and what techniques she uses to keep herself in a productive frame of mind, all week long.
Specifically, she’d made up a poster with an Olympic Medalist’s 5 rules to succeed and had placed it in a position above her desk where she could see it whenever she looked up. She said it gave her the motivation to keep going and offered a quick and easy way to ‘reset’ a negative or procrastinating mindset.
The 5 rules are:
- PURPOSE – Why are you doing what you are doing? Keep saying this until you get the real essence of why you are doing it,
- PLANNING – Use methods and follow them to get where you want to go. Do whatever it takes to get there! Your plan will change along the way but it will always end where you originally planned for it to be.
- PEOPLE – Surround yourself with people that are going to support you.
- PASSION – Stay passionate or you’ll eventually give up without it.
- PERSISTENCE – never ever give up!!! nothing groundbreaking happens without action.
It was a great little moment of motivation for me when I read those 5 rules and I thought with today being Wednesday, it was the perfect time to share with you this technique for getting motivation back. Overcoming the ‘mid-week hump’ can be one of the most arduous tasks of a business owner’s working week. After all, you’ve done two days of hard slog and still have two more up ahead before you get a break (that is, if you DO take a break on the weekend*).
Some people feel silly printing out motivational quotes or step by step processes like the ones above, to help them get back into their groove – but don’t underestimate this simple technique’s power in helping you achieve success.
Many team members in my office employ this trick – particularly those in sales and coaching roles, where energy (and frustration!) levels can fluctuate dramatically throughout the day. If you do feel silly, why not just ‘feel the fear and do it anyway!’? Try it for one week and see what your results are. I’d be interested to know what you think too – post a comment below and let me know!
*As an aside, if you’re still working more than a standard 36 hour week, you might want to take a look at one of New York Times Bestseller, the 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. Alternatively you might benefit from some business or personal coaching to improve your efficiency and cut down your hours at work!
