Mike Grogan – Building Good Habits and Routines for a Better You

Hi and welcome to another episode of Outsource Accelerator. My name is Derek Gallimore and we are joined by Mike Grogan today. Mike, if you haven’t listened to episode 6 go and listen to episode 6 where we also interviewed Mike Grogan and we introduce him and his mission and what he’s doing. Mike very briefly is a motivational guy. He is an author, he is a speaker, he is a coach and significantly he is an Irish guy based in the Philippines and really believes in the power of the Filipino and in building world class Philippines and Filipino tribe. Okay. So, Mike’s a great guy. He has a lot of insight into good habits, good routines and how to get the best out of people. So, today we are discussing with Mike exactly that. How do you get the best out of your people? And both from an empowerment point of view but also from a performance point of view. We look at that generally, people generally and then how that relates to the Philippines specifically. So, if you have an office here with staffing or you are looking to consider that then this episode is for you because it’s interesting insight. Okay. Enjoy the episode if you want any of the show notes if you want to get in touch with Mike Grogan or anything he is involved in please go to our show notes and that is at outsourceaccelerator.com/podcast/episode26. Enjoy.

We’re back with Mike Grogan. Hi Mike.

Mike: Hey.

Derek: Thanks for your time.

Mike: You’re welcome.

Derek: And today we are going a little bit left of center and we’re talking about morning routine and habits. So, there’s probably a lot of podcast listeners out there that know about these things. And personally, I am a big fan of morning routine habits. And it seems also Mike is and has now written a book on the topic called Unlocking the Habit Code. Now Mike Grogan has been on the show a couple of times before and he is a bestselling author, is a reputed speaker and celebrates the strengths of Filipinos and the habit code, I think I’ll let Mike explain it interlocks brilliantly with that for a very good reason. To outline how or why you’ve written a book which is more broad and I think also you’re not necessarily focusing on the Filipinos for this but how have you gone from celebrating the strengths of people and optimizing behaviors to morning rituals and habits.

Mike: Sure. Well for me this is my third book and I asked myself this question if I could only write one more book and this be my last ever book. For example, I want to write more of this but if I could only write one what would it be. And this is it and it’s, I really believe the power of. There’s so much myths about behavioral change about person. When we try to change behavior. For example, when we try and change your health. We try and stop destructive habits. We try and grow our business with or we try and recover from a broken relationship. We try and switch careers whatever it is. I really believe that the power of habits. And I believe that there is a total myth about behavioral change when we see people that are successful at us we make up lazy assumptions including our lazy assumptions that oh that person has the better willpower more discipline. And I believe that it’s total false. That is not the entire picture. I believe that behavioral change, habit creation, is easy if you follow the right formula and you focus on the right things. And it really that’s the core of the book

Derek: Willpower is clearly a muscle isn’t it. I mean I have a personal interest in health and longevity and muscle is clearly a muscle but they’re also saying that neurons and brain connective tissue is also needs to be exercised like a muscle. But then there’s also will power isn’t there which equally is a muscle and it fatigues. And if you’re still trying to stick to your guns and it’s 11:00 p.m. at night you haven’t eaten all day and it’s going to be it’s going to be a weakened muscle, isn’t it?

Mike: Exactly.

Derek: So, what are the routines that instill positive habits then or the process to discover those.

Mike: Well the problem this book wants to solve is not a knowledge problem. So, when I, as I’ve outlined in the book what I want to have most people know exactly what they need to do. And if I were to ask your listeners in terms of what the change is, the daily changes need to create your life. Most people that’s in 90 percent of people know what they should do. Eat healthier, be more disciplined wake up in time whatever that may be. I believe that’s not a number one problem our number one problem is in the application area. And for me and for millions of people around the world testifying to the power that the start of the day and for some people that people wake up at different times of the day whatever that star time is for me it’s 6:00 a.m. for you could be earlier or later. But getting of your day off from the right start by practicing the right set of habits whatever that those may be for you. And that has such a huge psychological effect on you winning that day you might end the day. So, for me the best one the best personal change I’ve made has been a morning ritual. Now what I do and I do when people ask me what I actually do actually before this call was on the first question they asked me the things I do that others would consider strange these things that you would agree with. But for me knowledge of what to do is not the biggest problem it’s not, it’s actually making it a habit. So, I’m not avoiding your question.

Derek: Yeah, yeah, yeah

Mike: So now I can pick up would you like me to pick some habits that I do that really help.

Derek:  Is there a potential for conflicting ideas and because there’s a lot of ambiguity out there and conflicts of this is the right thing. This isn’t the right thing even in such fundamental conflicts of “live in the moment” versus “make a plan”. You know there’s been sort of a lot of conflicting advice for people. And how do they know that what they’re launching into is necessarily sending them on the right path.

Mike: Well that’s where they most experiment in my call to action in the book is a 21-day challenge to experiment on your own morning ritual.

Derek: Right.

Mike: And you have I think I totally failed as the author and you waste your time as the reader if you just read this book and to consume more knowledge. We don’t need to listen to more TED talks. Listen to more podcast. Read more books our biggest problem is application. So, my real call to action is okay, I’ll show you in the book you read seven stories of seven different people transform in 21 days that you can read their morning rituals. I show my morning rituals but it’s not about whose is better. It’s about how you’re gonna experiment with yours over.

Derek: Right.

Mike: And we believe that’s even at least a minimum 21 days experiment to see the value of your own ritual.

Derek: Yeah, and how have you found this so. Are you weaving this in to the messages in your existing talks and existing programs at the moment. How do you find is, I suppose how has your experience with relaying this message and your experience with the existing morning rituals in the Philippines compared to Ireland or you know the West in inverted commerce.

Mike: Okay. Well I deserve. So, the book, the sister to the book is the training programs that I do focus on this so only a few days ago I ran a program and we hope to run these programs every month if not twice a month in Metro Manila, on the weekends for individuals. This program more is calling on individuals state for them to come and go on this 21-day journey. So, the reaction has been it’s been extremely inspiring for me and it’s nothing to do with me. I really believe that the workshop we just did was nine hours. I talked for less than 10 percent of that time. And what gives me most joy. It really does create an environment I really believe if you ask the right people and if you have the right people in the room. You ask them the right questions in the right way and give them enough time they’ll figure out the answer. So, the recipe or the formula. I give people in the book and the workshops. It’s just questions. It really is. But I get them in the right state of mind first. Because you really have to be in a positive state of mind. Then they answer 15 questions which is the formula for touching on all the elements of behavioral change. We actually, the beauty of this is I tell people in the book and in the workshop, I’m not telling you anything new. Your subconscious mind already knows this. We know how to form habits. And none of our listeners successful business men and women would be listening to this without having really got in your life success. But we already know how to find success habits in our subconscious mind. The book and in my workshops, all it wants to do is bring that awareness to your conscious mind.

Derek: And we intrinsically know what a good habit is and what a bad habit is don’t we.

Mike:  Oh yeah.

Derek: I mean, it’s pretty obvious. What are the significant differences about the Philippine workforce and especially within the BPO workforce is the impact of shift working. So, any person working for an American BPO, they are up through the night. There’s a huge impact on then sleep and diet and lifestyle. And it is it is a massive normality for the Filipinos to work not only a night shift but a variety of shifts. Have you seen an impact of that and how it affects people’s functioning or whether it’s so normalized now that it doesn’t?

Mike: Well, it does we have to be realistic. They’re working. Shit I’ve worked, when I was a junior, actually chemical engineering is my background.  I’ve gone off, I used to work night shifts and they do have an effect on the body. If you don’t look after yourself there’s a lot of chronic health issues in the Philippines. Not necessarily because of nightshift but the Filipinos are not able to manage their nightshift correctly in terms of, especially food, especially sleeping environments and especially addiction to social media. And as you know the….

Derek: The blue light.

Mike: The blue light, fake light stealing energy. So really when we shed some of these habits it’s really small a really, small tiny things they can do to optimize themselves so that they don’t, they get to go to work in a high-performance mindset. It doesn’t matter what time for example they get if they start their shift you can still use this approach to your morning ritual. Could be whenever you wake up from your deep sleep. That’s what I want to focus on to during the day or if it’s during the night. Whenever you wake up. It’s having that time where you dedicate yourself to growing. And that has a positive and really has a positive effect when you go into work.

Derek: Because that is actually maybe a significant insight we can make a day and life. These guys do have a little bit rougher than what we would consider normal within our societies. They can sometimes travel to two hours to work and back. They’re travelling through heavy rains. They’re doing night shift and then often they’re not necessarily having the best sleeping arrangements; proper bedrooms and things like that. So, it is something really to consider isn’t it in terms of their overall health and getting the best out of them.

Mike: It’s always meeting people where they’re at. Derek, I’ve, where I live where you live and where your listeners live, environment is so different. In most cases extremely common more comfortable. So that’s really the empathy to care for your workers and to help them improve their situations by education, and you’re really educating them. You can optimize on how you start your day.

Derek: True. That’s great. Thank you very much Mike.

Mike: No problem. Thank you so much.

Okay, I hope you enjoyed that chat with mike Grogan, he’s got a lot of great insights. If you want any more information on Mike if you want to get in touch if you want to buy his books please do so. If you want any more information do go to our show notes and all of his contact details of that including also the transcripts for this episode and more. His, the show notes are at outsourceaccelerator.com/podcast/episode26. See you next time.