Weeknote #649: New habits
Life in our office is getting back to normal after the holidays. Projects are running and inspiring new pitches are prepared.
A new year, a new decade. Currently, quite many of us are thinking, what happened in the last decade and what the upcoming one will bring to you. Naturally, this is also a great moment to set goals for the future — as the beginning of the new year always is.
It’s a well-known situation that in the first month(s) of the year people are, for instance, rushing into gyms with high hopes, but till April, the rush has gone, and only regular trainers are left. Some newcomers are determined enough to achieve the goals, but there are also a big bunch of people, who after a couple of weeks, fade the resolution from their minds because they don’t manage to change their old habits.
And that’s life, you can’t always succeed. But are there any ways that could help you to get a bit closer to the goal or at least make you feel more robust even though you didn’t reach the target completely?
Start with tiny steps and focus on to create habits
Be realistic about what it takes to achieve the goal. You can’t achieve huge goals by one step. Quite often, success requires that you change your habits. If you want to become an excellent facilitator, you actually have multiple possibilities per day to train your skills. Spot actively those moments around you, step up and practice your skills. Every time you decide to act, it will take you one small step closer to the goal. You will gain experience, and the skill starts to stick on you so that it becomes a natural habit.
Be kind to yourself
Sometimes you don’t have the energy to do what you should, or you failed miserably even though you tried your best. If you have promised yourself to read one business book per week, but your calendar is fully booked, it’s not wise to skip weekends night sleeps for reading. Read one chapter instead and try to get back to your routines next week. One section is better than nothing, and continuity will make you achieve the goal.
Ask someone to support you
It’s ok to agree with someone to support you in reaching your goal. Your friend, colleague, or coach can give you that necessary amount of support, which helps you keep on track. Discussing with someone who focuses only on you and asks the right kind of questions, can empower you big time. Quite often, people know what to do by themselves without being aware of it on the conscious level.
Have a great year and a decade!
What else happened this week?
Topias is waiting for the winter.
Matti had nice holidays and is now full of energy to push awesome things forward. 2020 will be great!
Jukka is back from a long holiday, focusing on train things again. Great stuff brewing.
Sari is happy that her colleagues are back from holidays and the teamwork continues again.
Helmi had a relaxing holiday in Barcelona, and now she is back continuing with research and interviews for a cloud platform project.
Liam’s looking forward to fresh projects in the fresh year!
Virpi: Roaring 20’s ahead
Monika has been busy preparing an exciting pitch for potential customers as well as conducting internal stakeholder interviews for the project she is working on.
Valeria is patiently waiting for winter to come.
Linda: 2020 has kicked off really nice and fresh!
Kenneth has a good feeling about the new year — new projects starting soon!
Sami: Happy 2020! I feel it’s going to be a good one.
Teppo is interested in biometrics.
Five things we read this week:
- The master list of 2020 design conferences from Invision — Why not attend one of the numerous design conferences 2020 has to offer.
- Group Decision Making’s Dirty Little Secrets from Julia Whitney at Leading Design London 2019 — Leading Design remain a favorite conference of ours, and this is a valuable talk from the most recent iteration.
- Preparing for 2030 — What do the next ten years hold? from Azeem Azhar — Mr. Azhar made interesting predictions on how societies and economies will be shaped in the upcoming decade.
- We Learned to Write the Way We Talk from The New York Times — As text-based communication has emerged as a primary real-time medium, our ability to include emotion and nuance has advanced to accommodate our needs.
- Sony surprises with an electric concept car called the Vision-S from Verge — Sony’s new car — surprising us because, well, Sony — features a panoramic display screen stretching from mirror to mirror through the dashboard — even a screen for the passengers!
Weeknotes are what happened at our studio this week. This week’s weeknote was curated by Joni Jalkanen
Joni is a Lead Designer at Nordkapp, who is right now defining his own goals for this decade.
