Clydesdale Horses and Productivity

Ever felt like you are doing the right thing but your growth is slow or stagnant?

Been there. Done that. Got the T-shirt.

For me, this happened in my results at the gym.

I work out….. a lot.

(I have worked out 607 times since Jan 1, 2020, & these are just the recorded sessions)

Exercise not only improves my mental clarity and stability, but it also helps me build a body I can be proud of.

Lastly, if I have to use my body to interact with everything around me, improving it improves all of my experiences.

The problem for me was:

My body was not improving.

I had reached a plateau.

Thinking back to my productivity principles, the first thing that came to mind was quantity.

If I started working out more, I would be able to make more improvements in my physique.

(Perhaps you have tried this before… If you have, you may already know this didn’t help)

Sadly, more workouts only left me more tired & hungry without the gains I sought.

Next, I tried the opposite end of the spectrum.

Instead of adding more quantity, I increased my workout quality.

To increase the quality and effectiveness of my workouts I:

• Started taking creatine before working out

• Paid for an expert workout routine

• Weighed myself daily

But I still was not seeing the results I was looking for…

I was distraught…

Until I started thinking and experimenting with a new approach that helped me recompose my body.

What was it?

I started taking my diet seriously

I am sure everyone familiar with fitness is rolling their eyes and thinking “Duh. Of course, you need to do that 😑”

And they are correct.

The solution to my fitness problem contains the solution to your productivity and performance issues too.

If you have maxed out your habit, the answer to experiencing a growth jump is not more quality or quantity.

The key is not to think in terms of quality or quantity in a single domain.

The key is to implement quality and quantity ACROSS adjacent domains.

The Problem With Quality

There’s been an increased focus on the concept of quality recently.

• Purchasing Quality, Long-Lasting Goods

• Crafting a High-Quality Life

• Living Quality Experiences

My accountability book club read “Everything That Remains” by The Minimalists (Joshua Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus).

The central theme is:

Center your actions and activity around the things you find to be important to build a high-quality life.

This narrative bleeds into productivity and high-performance culture as well.

But this framework leaves out something crucial.

What do you do when your commitment to quality stops working?

What do you do when you reach the point of diminishing returns?

The Problem with Quantity

Stop me if you’ve heard this before from a Twitter/YouTube/Audiobook/Podcast:

“The reason you are not seeing the results you want in your life is because you are not DOING enough. You need to do more!”

The problem with adding indiscriminate more into your life is, it increases the number of choices you have.

The more choices you have:

• The more Chaos you experience

• The more turns in the maze between you and your success

This is before even considering if you are doing the right “more”.

For example, you might try to become a better writer by writing more.

It gets you comfortable with the process BUT solely increasing your quantity will only improve the speed you can write, not increase your writing performance.

Quantity and Quality focused improvement are great for making incremental gains but are not the answer for making performance leaps.

1+1=3

Instead of choosing out of the “tidy-looking dichotomies” of quantity vs. quality for improvement, we should look at both as a partnership.

As an example, below is a picture of a Clydesdale horse.

These are workhorses used in farming and for hauling heavy goods

(Perhaps you have seen them in a Budweiser Commercial)

A single Clydesdale horse can haul up to 8,000 lbs.

If a horse owner had a goal of transporting significantly more goods and focused on a quality vs. quantity framework, it might look like this:

• Quality - Train the horse to pull more weight (8,000lbs —> 8,200lbs at a slower pace)

• Quantity - Horse has to haul load more frequently (4 trips/day —> 6 trips/day)

Both options are non-ideal because they are limited by the horse’s energy, the amount of daylight, and time.

The best solution for finding a way to deliver more goods is to place another horse in tandem.

A team of Clydesdale horses can pull up to 22,000 lbs! (almost 300% increase!)

Why is this happening?

The goal is being worked on in two different areas.

The two horses.

Instead of focusing the effort on improving and optimizing the work of one horse, you distribute the load across two horses to make jumps in performance.

Other examples of this are:

• Planning + Sleep = Jumps in Productivity

• Studying + Test-Taking Skills = Jumps in Grade Improvement

• Diet + Workout = Jumps in Body Performance & Composition

• Content Creation + Sales Acumen = Jumps in Business Success

Instead of choosing quality or quantity in a single domain, you pursue the same goal across differing domains.

How to Experience Growth Jumps

If you are experiencing stagnancy in the growth you are seeing in an area, this is how you make the next jump

(Note: Do NOT do this until you are proficient in your current habits AND your results are plateauing)

1. Uncover Your Reason

Uncover and highlight the “Why” behind the current habits you are performing.

• It’s not about reading 30min a day, it’s about improving your vocabulary

• It’s not about daily exercise, it’s about building a healthy lifestyle

• It’s not about 7-8 hours of sleep, it’s about having more energy

Find the true goal lying behind your habits.

2. Locate Adjacent Domains

Take time to think of other domains involved in achieving your goal.

For example, if your goal is to start a successful business, other domains are:

• Curriculum Building

• Content Creation

• Sales Acumen

• Marketing

Once you have identified your goals other, adjacent domains, move to the next step.

3. Choose ONE Additional Impactful Domain

To get the best result from this process, select the domain you are having the most trouble in.

Eliminating your largest problem is the best way to make a growth jump and improve your results.

4. Build a SMALL Habit

The next step is to build a small positive or corrective habit in your chosen domain.

There is an abundance of information about building successful habits but here are my top habit-building tips

• Make it Sexy- Tie it to your goal

  • “I may not want to watch my diet but I do want abs, so I will watch my diet.”

• Make it Small - Get the ball rolling

  • “I struggle with reading 30 pages per day, I will start with ONE page a day and build from there.”

• Make it Prompt - Build around your current activities

  • “Every day, after I brush my teeth, I will write ONE tweet.”

5. Stay Accountable

You can go through all of the steps listed above but if you are not holding yourself accountable for executing your habit, you will miss the benefit.

Hold yourself accountable to your habits and they will become more habitual quickly.

Ways you can do this are:

• Using an accountability tracker 

• Adding your habit performance to your 3-1-1 Review Process

• Getting an accountability partner with whom you share results with

When you are consistent at approaching your same goal from different angles, your results compound and you break through plateaus and experience growth jumps.

Let me know how this practice works for you!

- Matthew

P.S. If you are a solopreneur who wants help implementing this idea (or are struggling to get things done during the week), book a call with me today! I would love to help you.