The Life-Changing Magic of Daily Debriefs.
Be Brilliant In Your Business Podcast, Episode 98
“You improve what you practice, but you master what you measure” - Linsi Brownson
What worked today?
What didn’t work today?
What would I do differently?
These three simple questions have the power to change your life, and will help you make high-powered decisions for your business.
To conquer your goals and start making more strategic and intentional decisions in your business, all you need to do is set aside 15 minutes at the end of every day to answer these three questions.
I call this a Daily Debrief - a routine, ritual, or practice that you use to finish your work like (like the CEO you are).
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Why do a daily debrief?
In short, "you master what you measure."
It is so easy to get caught up in tasks that we think are necessary because we have been told to do them, or because they worked in the past. But becoming your next-level self and business requires you to think strategically about the future and think critically (not judgementally!) about the past, to find that sweet spot for your next moves.
Athletes are a great example of this. Their coaches have them watch game tapes to observe their own performance, and the coach gives them feedback as well. They can see exactly when they turned left instead of right, when they hesitated too long, or the perfect footwork pattern that led to their successful move. It’s so valuable!
Who should do a daily debrief?
If you are working on a short-term project or goal, doing daily debriefs during that phase will help you:
Stay on track with your plan.
Quickly make changes and adjustments as you need to, so you’ll waste a lot less time on busywork or tasks that just don’t have the impact you’re looking for.
Feel connected to your goal throughout the process. (Getting disconnected from our goals is often one of the biggest reasons why we fail and fall into our old patterns.)
If you are trying to stop overworking and create a better work-life balance, a daily debrief will help you:
Take better care of yourself throughout your day, and manage your energy in a healthier way.
End your workday on time.
Feel more in control of your day-to-day life. (The feeling of lack of control is often why we develop these workaholic or perfectionist tendencies and habits to begin with.)
A daily debrief will give you small consistent wins and encourage your to keep building on whatever it is that you’re working on to improve your life.
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How to do a daily debrief.
I recommend that you start bookmarking this daily debrief as the last activity that you do in your workday. Set aside 5 to 15 minutes at the end of your day.
I also recommend having a notebook or a place that is dedicated to this information, because you want to be able to easily refer back to all this awesome data that you're collecting. Later, you can do even more holistic review on a monthly, quarterly or annual basis (or at the end of your goal!).
Grab your notebook and answer these three questions about your day:
What worked?
What didn't work?
What would I do differently?
What if you don’t have time to do it daily?
You may be thinking "this sounds like a great idea, Linsi, but, I don't have time to do this every day."
I understand! And I'm gonna challenge you on that..because this is a high-impact habit that will have such a massive benefit to your business and to your life over the course of time. And I guarantee you that there are 15 minutes in your day where you're doing something that does not have that same benefit for you, right?
When you do this on a daily basis, you will immediately start making more high-powered decisions about how you spend your time.
And as a total bonus, if you've ever had the thought "I wish there was an off switch for my brain", this is the closest natural thing that you will find. Once you get into the habit of doing this, it really helps you shift gears quickly and create so much more clarity for the next day.
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Start small.
As for anything that you are intending to make a long-term habit, a slow introduction in a way that doesn’t make the daily debrief seem like a burden is key.
Whatever time you can manage, start today. Make time for the debrief by examining your day and seeing where you can borrow 5 minutes from to save you time and energy later. Once you get into the habit of it, it really helps you shift gears and create clarity for the next day.
After today’s daily debrief, sit back, relax, and give yourself a good pat on the back. Congratulations, you have just taken the first step towards changing your life and your business for the better. Now, since you have reflected on the day, you have full permission to turn off your brain and rest it for tomorrow.
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Episode 98 Transcript
You are listening to Be Brilliant in your Business, the podcast that helps creative business owners take charge of your time and energy so you can run your business confidently without burning out. I'm your host, Linsi Brownson, and I'm here to deliver a creative cocktail of pep talks and practical tools to help you clear your head, take action, and enjoy the process of running your business. Before we dive into today's episode, I want to welcome new listeners. I'm so glad you're here and I look forward to being part of your brilliant business. Be sure to hit the subscribe button and even better, head to bebrilliantlistener.com to grab your new listener goodie bag.
Are you ready? Let's go.
Hey, hey Mavericks. Welcome to the show. Today, I am bringing to you another daily practice that will change your life. Yes, it sounds dramatic, I stand behind it fully. So, a couple of episodes, my guest Molly and I were talking about energy works specifically around money and how that practice has changed my life significantly. And it will. If you're doing that work, you will see such a massive difference in your experience of money and how you make money and how you create it and how you spend it. So, I highly recommend checking out that episode if you haven't been doing that energy work.
Today's episode or today's daily practice is one that will help you show up as the CEO of your business and the CEO of your life in a way that you've probably never experienced quite like this before. It will help you make high-powered decisions, it will save you from wasting precious time on things that are not working and not worth your time, and it will give you so much more clarity and help you feel less overwhelmed in your day to day. The life changing magic of daily debriefs.
So, before I get into what this is and how to do it, I'm going to level with you. This is a very challenging habit for me to adopt myself. And all of the reasons that I just gave you are the exact same reasons that I actively tell myself because on most days, I don't feel like doing it. I'm a very future-focused personality type. I love visualizing, I love strategic planning, and by the time I finish something, my brain is already 10 steps ahead and on to the next thing. So, I don't particularly love looking backward at things that have already happened, especially when they didn't go exactly as I planned. Which is always. 100% of the time things don't go the way I think they're supposed to go. But, I've always been fascinated with the habits and the mindset of highly successful people and this is a practice, this self evaluation practice, it is inarguably important if you want to hone your craft or your skill in anything. Whether we're talking about athletes, artists or everyday life, you improve what you practice, but you master what you measure.
Because our behavior is so nuanced how we do things is actually pretty particular. But, it's completely old hat to us, we don't notice or examine most of the things that we do. And this is by design, it's very useful to us when it comes to the mundane things in our lives. But, as entrepreneurs and creatives, learning new things and developing our skills is part of what drives us personally and it's also essential for the livelihoods that we've chosen.
So, for us, if we're not growing we're miserable. So, we need to do things that are constantly helping us up our game and improve our skills in whatever area that we are focused on.
So, enter the daily debrief. What it is, is three simple questions: What worked? What didn't work? And what would I do differently? See? Very simple, but very profound. I have tried much more complicated ways of evaluating business or personal performance. But these three questions give you all the insight you need with none of the drama.
So, how do you do a daily debrief? What I recommend is to start bookmarking this as the last activity that you do in your workday. Set aside 5 to 15 minutes at the end of your day. And I also recommend having a notebook or a place that is dedicated to this information, because you want to be able to easily refer back to all this awesome data that you're collecting so then you can do even more holistic reviews later on. So, at the end of your work day, close down your computer, grab your notebook and answer these three questions about your day. What worked? What didn't work? And what would I do differently?
Alright, I'm going to mind read here a little bit again and say you're probably thinking "you know, this sounds like a great idea, Linsi, I totally get it. But, I don't have time to do this every day". And my response to that is, I get it. I understand. And you're wrong. I'm gonna challenge you on this because this is one of those high-impact habits that will have such a massive benefit to your business and to your life over the course of time. And I guarantee you that there are 15 minutes in your day where you're doing something that does not have that same benefit for you, right?
So, I want you to think about this as a healthy swap for your business. This is like finding a new sugar free recipe for your favorite dessert. So, what is something that you could take 15 minutes away from things like scrolling on Instagram, which may feel like networking to you, but you don't really know if it is you don't really know the benefit of Instagram unless you're actually measuring and evaluating it, right? So, this is something that can even help you figure out if the things that you think are working are actually giving you what they're supposed to be giving you.
So, it is time to grab your CEO hat, and end your day like the boss that you are. When you do this on a daily basis, you will immediately start making more high-powered decisions about how you spend your time. And as a total bonus, if you've ever had the thought "I wish there was an off switch for my brain", this is the closest natural thing that you will find. Once you get into the habit of doing this, it really helps you shift gears quickly and create so much more clarity for the next day.
So, can you do it weekly instead of every day? Or just when you're working on a specific project or a specific goal that you want to keep track of? My answer is sure. For my clients who are launching something or working on a short term project, doing these daily debriefs during that phase helps them stay on track with their plan, and it helps them quickly make changes and adjustments as they need to. So, they end up wasting a lot less time and they feel connected to their goal throughout the process. That is one of - often one of the biggest reasons why we fail to reach our goals because at some point through the process, we get disconnected from why we're doing it in the first place and fall into our old patterns of disappointment or doubt or forgetting what it is that we are even working on, right? So, doing these daily debriefs, if you want to try this for something that is specific and short term, that can be a great place to start and will give you a lot of insight and help you stay on track with your goals.
But, I also find that daily debriefs are one of the most effective practices for building new habits. So, for a lot of my clients who are trying to create better work-life balance these daily debriefs help them take better care of themselves throughout their day and manage their energy in a whole new way - in a much healthier way. It also helps them end their workday on time and it helps them feel more in control of their day-to-day life. Which that feeling - that lack of control is often why we develop these workaholic or perfectionist tendencies and habits to begin with. So, basically, the daily debrief gives them the small consistent wins that encourage them to keep building on whatever it is that they're doing to improve their lives.
So, if that is where you're at right now, this is really going to help you. But I want you to start small. Making sweeping declarations of big changes in our life - that rarely works. We just can't jump straight to the finish line, we have to go through the process. So, it's really important that we take this on a day by day basis.
So, all I'm asking for you to do today is today's debrief. At the end of today, sit down and ask yourself these questions about your day. And then tomorrow, do it again. I will challenge you to run a little experiment with yourself and to try to do this for 10 consecutive days. Not only will that give you some really great insight into your business on the days that you're working, but it will also give you great insight into your thoughts about your business on the days that you are not working. Because, hopefully, there will be at least one - if not a few days - that you are not working over the next 10 days. If that is not the case, it needs to be. You need to take a day off. So, do this experiment for 10 days. Just take it day-by-day trying to do this debrief and make that a part of your life.
And at the end of these 10 days, then you have the chance to go back and look at all of the patterns and the things that you can see about the data that you've collected. So, it's kind of meta, but you're going to evaluate your evaluation challenge. See what it is that you see: what worked, what didn't work, and what would you like to do differently? And how is this impacting your business and your thoughts about your business on the whole from starting to implement this practice?
Alright, Mavericks. I hope that this has been helpful. And I would love to know if you are doing this experiment. And I want to know how it goes. So, please take a screenshot of this episode and tag me on Instagram @bebrilliantpodcast, and @linsibrownson, and I'm here to support you along the way. I also think it would be really fun to share some of your takeaways here on the podcast as a follow up. So, please keep me posted because I would love for listeners to see the impact of this work on a bigger scale.
Okay, have a fabulous week and I will talk to you soon.
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