A few weekends ago, I read a book called Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg, a New York Times investigative reporter and the author of the best-selling book The Power of Habit.

Smarter Faster Better focuses on productivity and why some people and companies are so good at getting a lot done. Duhigg explores how motivation, goal setting, focus, decision-making and data play a role in one’s productivity.

The book is very well researched and written. The real-life examples animate his points. For instance, in the chapter on absorbing data, Duhigg cites studies that show when people interact with data they internalize it better. He writes about school teachers in Ohio who had fancy dashboards and data on each student, but simply reading reports or charts on each student‘s performance did not help them figure out how to teach better. They really wanted to see their students’ test scores improve, but they were overwhelmed with the data and did not know how to apply the information to see results in their classrooms.

When Ohio implemented the Elementary Initiative, each teacher in this underperforming school had to spend a couple of hours a week in a conference room filling out index cards on each student. At first, they thought it would be a waste of time. However, they were soon able to see patterns and trends they were unaware of before, and they adjusted their behavior in the classroom. Eight months later the kids sat for the yearly assessment test scores and the results were dramatic with overall scores more than doubling over the previous year.

I loved this example and began thinking about how to apply it to our business. We use SalesforceIQ to track business development activities, but looking at the charts on your computer is not the same as interacting with the data.

Motivated by Duhigg’s book, our team is now also keeping track of progress with potential new clients on index cards. Specifically, the manager leading the new business effort gets an index card and notes the stage of the deal in the sales cycle. We also track the size of the deal and record which of us will work on the new business pitch. Receiving an index card also symbolizes ownership.

The experiment with the index cards has been fun, and like the teachers in Ohio, we are able to see some new patterns that were not as apparent from looking at reports in SalesforceIQ. Our sales pipeline meetings have taken on new energy with more in-depth discussions and brainstorming.

If you have a spirit of continuous improvement or just want to learn more about the secrets of being productive, this book is a must-read.

Image by Elizabeth Alter