My Top 10 Tips to Improve Performance

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Never miss an episode and subscribe and listen at dawnmcgruer.com. Welcome to episode 67 of Dawn of a New Era with myself, Dawn McGruer, digital marketing speaker, author and trainer. And today we're going to be looking at something really exciting.

We're going to be looking at my top 10 tips for better performance. And this is something that has really come around about people asking me about what I do in my daily routine, things that I do, things that I take, any rituals that I have. And I just wanted to share some of the things that I've been trying out, some of the results that I've gotten. And by no means am I saying that you have to do all 10.

These are just some of the things that I'm doing. You know, I always like to focus on how I move my energy forward, how I build a better day, and how I design my diary for my dreams. And this is about looking at what you want to do and areas that you feel need a little bit of a zhuzh and a little bit of an improvement. So tip number one is all about space.

It's about creating time for nothing. And this sounds crazy because we're so busy, aren't we? And this can be busy in your career, it can be busy in your business. It really doesn't matter what you're doing, but everything seems to be moving at this so super fast pace.

And really we want to slow things down and start really embracing what's happening, being more mindful, being more present, and just reducing the stress levels around every activity we do and getting a better performance and a better experience. So if you look at your diary and it makes you feel kind of dread or panic, mine used to be like this, you need to give it a little bit of a vamp. And, you know, by reorganizing things, you start to understand how you perform. So first of all, I would recommend stepping back and not rushing things.

Now, so tempting, isn't it, when you look at social media, you— You start to get FOMO. People just seem to be doing these bigger and better things. You know, they've taken action. It could be that we've had a holiday, it could be after summer, it could be after Christmas, it could be the start of a new year, and you see people jumping on the 1st of January, you know, epic promotions, launches, all these things happening.

You're thinking, Oh my goodness, I'm still on holiday. Don't worry about it, because for me, I don't come back until mid-Jan, and I don't do anything until then. Because what you see happen is that everyone jumps on the 1st of January, and then it kind of peters out by about day 10 or 14, and it allows the space. There's less going on, and people are back to work.

So for me, I just always feel that people take more recognition. They see what we're doing because we're not kind of jumping on that. Now, it works for some people to do it on the 1st of Jan, but for me, it doesn't. So you've got to find the mix for you, and take a step back and don't do anything too knee-jerk.

Sometimes just assessing the situation and thinking about it and allowing yourself that space will give you better objectivity on making that decision and coming back with what is going to work better for you, for your career or your business. Now, in my diary, I track my moods. Now, you can do this just on a spreadsheet. You don't need fancy apps or anything like this.

You can just track in a calendar how you feel day to day and when your peak times are working for you. So if, for instance, I am not a Monday person, I do not want to do a huge amount of calls on Monday, so I don't. Thursday is the day I do it, and I do calls on Thursdays because it just kind of gives me that energy to just get into the week, get things done, and plan for the calls. This was the most important thing for me, making sure that I had a call and I'd absolutely planned on a Word document what was going to happen in the call, what the objectives were for the call, and what I needed to leave with on that call.

What a game changer that was. Now, it meant that I wasn't having calls for any pointless reason. It means— It means that I can put reoccurring calls in, and we don't have to do the, you know, the when are you free? You know, can you do a call here?

I always use a Calendly link. I never do these emails back and forward like, Oh, let me know when you're free. It's always, Here's my link, book it in, and it just saves time and energy for everybody. Now, I also do recording on a Thursday.

So on a Thursday afternoon, I would like to do, like, social media content for training courses and just getting everything in place. I might do a batch of podcasts in that time. So by content chunking, it means also I plan for that time in the afternoon. I've got time and energy and space.

I prefer to record in the afternoon because I kind of, I'm up, I'm ready. I've been speaking, I've been doing. So when I come to creating content, it's not like the first thing I'm doing every day. Now, on a Friday, I have specific things I do every Friday morning, and I have a Friday afternoon off and a Wednesday afternoon.

Friday, less kind of free space. It's more kind of catching up on things, whereas Wednesday is I don't put anything in. And it may be that I do end up working on my business because it gives me that time and energy just to sit and plan and look at forecasts, look at strategies, look at what we've been doing, do a little bit of an audit of what we've been doing online. And sometimes it might be I'm working on something for a client, so I might want to take that time just to kind of go and audit everything, do some research.

So Wednesday afternoon is more about kind of my space and clarity. And for instance, like, as I said, on a Monday, I don't want to be doing anything in terms of calls. That's my kind of day of catch up and admin. I kind of get rid of all the things I don't like doing on a Monday.

So by Tuesday, my energy has changed and I'm into my working week. So you've got to find what works for you. Now, number two, sometimes if you struggle with a bit of brain fog or you struggle to kind of get into projects, you're procrastinating, you just need a little bit of a refocus, really. I've started taking these Bach Rescue capsules called Fresh and Focus, and they, well, they say they sharpen the mind.

Focus for busy days, you know, and they're all about supporting concentration, focus, and mental clarity. They've got different sort of plant extracts and botanical extracts in there, so things like vegan omega-3, B vitamins, flower essences, all these things. Now, I've no idea whether these things work, but for me, it makes a difference. Now, that could just be the placebo effect, who knows?

But it definitely does something for me, and just kind of getting into that routine, it just means that I feel that by the time that I start work, I'm kind of on it. Now, number three, I do this every month, and it's something I've started doing recently, and it's an adaptogenic juice cleanse, a medicinal juice cleanse by Pure Earth. Now, there's loads of different juice cleanses out there, and I'm definitely not someone who wants to do it for like three days, seven days. I mean, I know people who do it for a whole month.

For me, 24 hours is enough. And what I do is they deliver the juices, everything's ready, and the whole focus is about boosting your energy and really managing your stress levels. And this medicinal juice cleanse, everything in it is about nurturing that. So all the Ayurvedic herbs in it, and the lovely sort of milks and juices.

There's a broth at night. I just feel like it resets kind of my sugar levels and things like that. So that for me mentally, if I've done that for 24 hours, I am less likely to eat things that I shouldn't be eating thereafter. It just kind of resets and makes me behave a bit better in my eating.

And also I feel better the next day. I just feel lighter, more focused, just more energy. Now, number four is something that I do as well. I'm not saying that I don't drink.

I'm just saying I'm trying to reduce some of my drinking. So you see some people doing like a dry January. I'd be more about a damp January where I might have the odd drink, but generally I don't want to be drinking as much, so I kind of reduce it. So I've been using Three Spirit.

Now, Three Spirit is a great, great drink. It's been designed by plant scientists and bartenders, and it's meant to stimulate the palate, body and mind. So they're using all of these different sort of herbs to really kind of change the way that your sort of mood is, to give you a bit of a livener. And they even have one which is a nightcap to help you sleep.

So there's three different drinks: Livener, which gives you a bit of a boost, so, you know, it's like your party drink. Then you've got your Social Elixir, which is just like a mood booster. And then you've got your Nightcap, which really kind of helps settle you down before you go to bed. So completely non-alcoholic, and I just put things like sparkling water in.

There's all sorts of different recipes you can use in there, but they're really low calorie and vegan. And, you know, even if you're just finishing work and you feel that you just want, you know, a different drink, you know, have one of these as your routine. Now, loads of different ones on the market you can try. I just particularly like these.

I like the taste and I like the feeling that they give.

Now, number five is about decluttering and organising. So I'm the sort of person who really needs that clarity and focus, which is around organisation. So I like to feel control. So I know that if I go and clear out my clothes and get everything organised, my desk and things like that, it's like a tidy mind means that I really feel like I'm on track.

So if I get everything else I can sorted, then I'm kind of left with this smaller list of things that I need to deal with. And for me, it's about decluttering and organising. So once a month, I might just kind of say, well, for this week, I'm just going to kind of declutter ten things a day and just try and think about it. So, like, my clothes are out of control.

I just do not know how I have collated so many handbags, shoes, clothes, things like that. So I'm trying to get organised. So I will literally put my partner through the pain of trying things on and saying, should I keep? Should I get rid of?

And just by having someone there to just kind of make me, you know, cleanse and get rid of things and put things in bins or put things for charity, it helps. And then I feel better because I can start to see my clothes better. And I, you know, when I'm getting dressed in the morning, it's organised, it's colour coded, it's great. And then it gets out of control again and I have to do the whole sorry thing again.

Now, number six, this is about not spending hours on Netflix. What I found is that in an evening, there's lots of different things I need to be doing. But when I was finishing and, you know, for instance, I'd have my dinner and I'd just sit down and watch hours and hours of it, you have to kind of limit it or at least do some of your tasks and then sit down and do it. I'm not saying get rid of it because I do quite enjoy watching box sets and movies and spending time with my partner doing it.

But making it more planned and kind of thinking, right, okay, do X, Y and Z and then sit down and maybe at nine o'clock, you know, move into it and then do not get into the, oh, let's watch another box set, which we've all been there and done where, you know, it's two o'clock in the morning and you're like, let's just do one more. We're nearly at the end. You know, you have to have a cutoff time and try and get into a normal bedtime routine, which brings me on to number seven, which is about your routines. Now, most people kind of think about, oh, you know, having a bath at the end of the night and having a bedtime routine, which I'm a total advocate for, you know, using things like pillow sprays and dehumidifiers in the bedroom.

We bought a dehumidifier and I put it in the bedroom, and it's got like a menthol scent as well. You know, all of these things are great. And for me, having like a nice clear kind of atmosphere, it did help my sort of just whole kind of feeling. So again, making sure that the space you're sleeping in is nice and calm, you know, and fresh bed sheets and routines and not, you know, being on your phone all the time is great, but Think about your morning routine as well, not just your bedtime.

So everyone kind of thinks about getting up in the morning, you know, whether you're in the 5 a.m. club or whatever, and it's like, right, go, go, go. Well, maybe you just need a slower morning routine, and this is something that made a life-changing, life-changing impact on me.

So I was used to just getting up, getting to my desk, you know, and that was the focus. That was the only thing. So like, you know, by seven, you're just on it, you're doing emails and things like that. And then I would just sit at my desk for hours and hours and hours through to lunch, you know, from seven o'clock through to like one o'clock, and I wouldn't move.

So maybe slowing down your morning routine and thinking about having a bath in the morning, you know, what do you want to do in the morning? For me, I like to get up, do my walking machine. I'm not really a runner. I like to do fast incline walking.

And then for me, we were very lucky to buy a hot tub, and just going out and sitting in the hot tub after that, spending time just chatting through, working out my day, and then having breakfast and then starting work at like nine. You know, what's wrong with that? You know, even just getting up and having just a 10 minutes, you know, on your own before, you know, everyone else gets up, whatever works for you, but just maybe slowing it all down and thinking, what is the rush? You know, you don't have to be doing things just because society says that, you know, we work amazingly well at 5 a.

m. I'm not ever going to be in that club. And, you know, if you are, great, it works for you. But for me, it's just not the thing that is, I suppose, motivates me.

It doesn't kind of invigorate me. Even kind of getting up and doing exercise, what I found is certain exercise works for me. So number eight is all about how you plan doing your kind of self-care and exercise. So in the morning, I like walking, and I don't want to leave the house.

I just wanted to do it there, put my gym stuff on and just kind of get into the day. And what I found is by doing my personal training sessions, so I do three a week, on an afternoon, I do them at three o'clock. That felt really different for me in terms of energy, but also it gave me Take me a cut off for work to kind of stop and take a time out, because if I just stayed at my desk, I would just work forever. So I needed something that would kind of reinvigorate, and then switching up the exercises and not doing too much.

So I have a different trainer each time in those three sessions, which is great because I have different conversations, different energy, and different exercises totally. You know, it's a whole different workout with each person because they have their different style. And then on a Sunday, I've started doing reformer Pilates in the morning while my partner goes road biking. So if you've seen this, it's like on a machine, and I just really like the energy for it.

So I'm not doing too much. I'm just kind of spacing it out, and then I'll have Tuesday, Thursdays, and Saturdays off. I'll probably still do maybe my walking, could be indoors or out, and I'll do something. But, you know, if I didn't, it doesn't matter.

I've done my other exercises. Now, number nine. This is about having a vision, and I do my vision board on a canvas, and I just stick different things onto it, and I have it on like a little easel. It's small, and it's just on my desk, so it's just constantly in front of me.

And it has just simple things. I don't ever go past ten things. I like ten as a number, and I just literally have three in my sort of work focus, three in my kind of life and relationship side of things, and then I have three which are in my kind of really enrichment, big dreams side of things, and then I have one which is kind of an overall goal. So the other thing I do is day to day, I have what I call my road to enrichment actions.

I have this in a spreadsheet, and these are things that enrich me, things that I have control of. So what do I want to be doing? And it's just things that make a difference. Now, these can be small things.

It could be about you just really want to take your journal and go and sit in a cafe and have a coffee for an hour. Those are the enriching actions. Anything that really brings joy to your life needs to be on this list, and you just start working through it. Like, what do you want?

Oh, do you want to go for a massage once a week? Do you want to be Meeting a friend for a coffee or your family or something like that. What really is the thing that makes you happy? And these are the things that go on your road to enrichment actions.

And honestly, when you just check in with these once a day, and you can even do it on Trello so that it gives you reminders and you can link it to your calendar. You know, you can start to put these things in. It just switches your focus. So if you're feeling a bit down or you ever feel a bit depressed, you have to change course.

So then go back to your road to enrichment and do one thing from there. And honestly, it's very difficult to stay in that mood. Sometimes, you know, you're not going to get out of, you know, a depression because these things are, you know, a cause that you need to get over and it takes time, you know. So healing is not something that happens overnight.

What you can do is just make yourself feel marginally better. And sometimes, you know, when we think about success, success is often just picking yourself up and getting through the day. So success and milestones don't have to be big things. You know, if you're at a place where something has happened and it's really knocked you off course, if you're getting up in the day, you're giving back, you're doing something, and you're just surviving that day, sometimes that is just enough, you know.

So just be very mindful that when you see people's goals and ambitions online, people are at different stages. People have different things going on in their life, and you have to be kind of respectful to yourself and think if you need to take time, take the time. It's not always about, you know, you see these people, you know, everyone's talking about, oh, you've got to add the next million to your business. You know, success is relative to you and where you are at.

If you're just starting your business, it's completely unrealistic, you know. So just block those things out and think about what success is to you and focus purely on that. Now, as we come to the end, this is my favorite one. This is number 10, and number 10 is about rewarding.

So I've started playing this board game, which I've made myself, which is my road to enrichment, and it's kind of drawn out, and it's a little road. You can do this on a piece of paper. If you're creative, you can do it online. If you've got graphic design experience, you mean you...

You can make it look amazing, but it's literally just kind of a little road, and I have different milestones. I have 10, surprisingly enough, and for each milestone that I hit, I have a little reward. So at the moment, there's a pair of shoes that I feel that I need in my life. There is no rational reason I need these.

I just like them, and they are Dior trainers with a gold heel, and they are amazing. So I need these, and something that I've got on my reward game board. So as I hit a milestone, I get that reward, and it means that I know that I'm really working towards something. Because for me, motivation is not just about kind of money.

It's not about, you know, hitting all of these goals in business. It's sometimes about, like, just having a little treat and just breaking that success cycle so that you are recognizing it, celebrating, and rewarding. So think about what you want in your game board and put 10 really exciting milestones on, really inspiring, really big things, and then go out and celebrate. Now, it doesn't mean you have to buy something for yourself.

It could be giving something to your family. It could be booking a holiday or going away with your partner. But make it about you, something that really, really will make a difference.

I hope you enjoyed my 10 tips. I hope they were useful. And just a quick reminder, number one is about creating space, getting your diary in order. Number two is about my clarity and focus.

I'm taking, obviously, these Rescue Remedy, but what could you do to kind of brighten your mind? Number three was my cleansing, and you don't have to do a juice cleanse, but maybe it's just one day a month you do something different. Number four is about, obviously, my not drinking. Am I having my damp January or my damp February, and having these drinks.

Now, it could be that you just like having a latte, you know, or a coffee out somewhere, but changing up. What are your mood lifters? Now, number five, decluttering and organizing, making sure that, you know, your mind feels organized and free. Number six, not getting drawn into the Netflix, but having a clear schedule to get things organized.

Number seven, looking at your evening, but also your morning routine, and maybe having a slower pace. Number eight, choosing a time that exercise is better for you. Number nine, your vision, your vision board and your road to enrichment actions, things that really make you happy. And last of all, number 10, having your rewards and making sure that you have these milestones in place that are really inspiring, these big dreams, but also that that breaks down into these little actions, these little milestones that are getting you towards that bigger goal, so that you're rewarding yourself on the journey.

Because remember, we have to enjoy the journey, not just be focused on the goal. So I hope that was useful. I hope you enjoyed it, and let me know how you get on with your actions. And don't forget, you can follow me.

If you head to DawnMcGruer.com, you can find obviously my books, my podcasts, and also on the academy. If you just go to Google, and if developing your digital marketing skills is something you want to do, then head on over, Business Consort Digital and Social Media Academy. We have trained and certified over 30,000 students.

So if online marketing is something that you really want to add to your goal list, go and check us out. Lots of courses and qualifications, and they're all Chartered Institute of Marketing accredited, so you get an amazing certificate for achieving any of the courses, or also we do qualifications too. And if that's something that you'd like to know about, go on, head over, find out a bit more about us. Lots of free resources on there, guides and videos.

And yeah, remember to follow us at Business Consort or at Dawn McGruer. So take care, and I will see you on the next episode. Thank you for listening to Dawn of a New Era podcast, and for your free checklist to find out how to boost your business for growth, profit and success, and join our community, go to DawnMcGruer.com.