Everything we do is a strategy – regardless of whether we’re aware of it or not.

We run both successful strategies (those that take us towards what we want) and unsuccessful strategies (those that keep us stuck where we are or take us further away.) When talking about strategies in this way, I mean a series of steps that you take in order to produce an outcome.

Our strategies are usually so unconscious that not only are we unaware that most of what we do is made up of various strategies, but even if we have awareness of this, we are unlikely to realise that we’re creating our outcomes via a series of steps. We are running on auto-pilot so much of the time that we tend to do the same things over and over out of habit, even when it doesn’t work for us.

Obviously we can’t always get what we want – there may be factors outside of our control, but if we can adopt a successful strategy in a particular area, we’ll significantly improve our odds.

When you understand this, you realise that you can change your outcomes in a particular area by identifying your own strategies, interrupting your unsuccessful ones and then adopting strategies that have a greater chance of working.

You can do this by learning other people’s successful strategies and you can then “model” them by applying how they do something.

 

Identify an unsuccessful strategy

This step is about taking something that isn’t working for you and breaking it down to identify your current strategy in this area. Let’s use decision-making as an example. If this is something that you find challenging, you could identify your strategy so that you become aware of how you “do” your version of decision-making.

When you have a decision to make, what specifically do you do? In what order do you do it? Use your senses to break down the steps.

An unsuccessful decision-making strategy could run something like this:

  1. Receive some information that informs that you need to make a decision (the information could be in the form of something you see, feel or hear)
  2. Delay making the decision
  3. Tell yourself you need to hurry up and make the decision
  4. Feel bad/anxious that you are being indecisive so you procrastinate further (this could be an ongoing loop)
  5. Wait for someone or something to remind you that you have to make the decision (could be some kind of “stick” such as: a threat/fear of the pain of delaying the decision/someone putting pressure on you in some way)
  6. Avoid making the decision by ignoring the “stick”
  7. Feel even worse about avoiding the decision
  8. Crunch time comes/the deadline arrives so you make any rash decision or avoid making the decision altogether so something or someone else makes the decision for you
  9. Feel bad/frustrated/angry that you got a poor outcome

How to interrupt or change this unsuccessful strategy? For each of the steps in this process of “doing” decision-making you could then substitute what you currently do with another, different action. In that way you’ll disrupt your strategy… which is likely to lead to a different outcome.

You could keep changing each step of the strategy until you hit on a series of steps that works effectively – i.e. one that leads you to the outcome you want in this area. Or you could speed up the process by finding someone you know who makes effective decisions, finding out how they do it and copying their approach.

 

Using “modeling” to create a successful new strategy

Find someone who is ahead of you in their journey in the area in which you want to make improvements. Depending on the area, you might not want to reach too far too soon. For example, if you’ve never done any exercise before and you want to improve your fitness, you may not find it helpful or appropriate to model an Olympic athlete.

Ask them to help you break down the steps required to achieve the result. Depending on how big the goal is, there might be many steps. Start simple.

Let’s look at something relatively simple. Say you don’t sleep very well and you know someone who does. You could find out what strategies they have for sleeping well. Chances are they have some kind of routine habits that create the conditions for sleep. Have them break down the steps for you and note them down in order so you can copy their strategy.

What do they do? In what order? What don’t they do?

Think about all that could go into a successful sleep strategy – caffeine, food and liquid intake, exercise, media, social media, pre-bed rituals, reading.

 

Some strategy examples

Some examples where applying someone else’s successful strategy could be useful:

  • Saving (money)
  • Decision-making
  • Having fun
  • Relaxing
  • Learning something new
  • Healthy eating
  • Finding a job

 

General strategies for success

And here’s a short-list of some general, common, over-arching strategies for success – regardless of how you define it – all of which can be developed:

  • Train yourself to see opportunities instead of obstacles in EVERY situation
  • Focus on the outcome
  • Have consistency of action rather than stopping and starting
  • Cultivate behavioural flexibility – be light on your feet and capable of changing your mind and actions as required in order to achieve your desired outcome
  • Be far more concerned with what you think of yourself than what other people think of you
  • Take action even though it’s imperfect and adjust accordingly along the way
  • Be proactive and don’t wait for things to come to you/the situation to improve/opportunity to knock
  • Say “yes” and figure out how
  • Constantly learn and grow
  • Seek and act on feedback
  • Implement and apply what you learn as soon as possible
  • Play at 100%
  • Work towards excellence rather than perfection
  • Do it even though it takes effort, is unfamiliar, uncomfortable, uncertain and maybe even scary
  • Focus on what you want, not what you don’t want
  • Feel the fear and do it anyway