The compound effect

Before digging into this discussion, I want to show you an example of a compound effect that changed my life and leveraged it into a version ✨

I am a very procrastinating person. In a group of 10 people, for example, I am typically the last one to arrive. Even in a group of 100 people, I may still be among the last few to arrive, which is not much better than being the last one. At work, the lovely company allow their employee comes to the office between 8:30 to 9:30am as long as we make it 8 hours per working day. So I show up at 9:28 every day, enjoy my break fast while BD team having their daily meeting at 9 am, then I cry alone and stay late at work while others have already left. I know the person I am, I was allowed to do this because my friends love me (very much), my companies love me (I guess so). I was allowed to do this because I always put myself in the situation that I can procrastinate.

Everything will probably not change, I might end up experiencing a similar outcome if I don’t challenge myself by choosing an opportunity that is a bit uncomfortable for me: a corporate organization over a start-up company. I have to show up at work at 8:00 every day, 1 minute late and half of the working day is deducted, sounds fair. Is there a way for someone who typically wakes up at 8:30 am every day and stays up until 1 am to switch to a new schedule in an instant? Sure not! Proud to be the person I am, I will procrastinate to the last minute to show up at the office and for some unexpected obstacle, I probably end up being late 20 days per month. With this thought, I tried to change the old habit but in an easy way, 1 minute sooner everyday.

1 minute is not hard, right? Driving faster, running faster, doing everything faster so I can have one more minute sooner than expected: 7:58 am. I felt awesome with 1 minute faster. By doing it as a routine, I became good at it and did things faster, I arrived at 7:55 am. Despite the improvement, I still felt unsatisfied and decided to optimize my time by preparing stuff in advance the night before. Starting with 1 minutes everyday faster, I make it 10 – 15 minutes sooner everyday at work and feel happy about it because I am ahead of time. I call it “the compound effect” in my case.

01. Requires times:

This process took me 3 weeks, not a day. The compound effect requires time to work its magic. We can not expect a significant change in anything in life: to reach an advanced level in a foreign language you will need at least 480 hours;  it could take 20,000 to 25,000 hours to truly master a subject; it takes around three to six years to grow a mature lemon tree from seed. Just some examples you might already know to remind you that everything needs time.

02. Small actions:

This process forced me to change, not everything at once but by small actions. It would be really hard for you if you started to run 10 km for the first time, it goes the same if you want to lead a team of 10 people without any leadership experience, you have to start with small improvement. It might not seem like you’re making much progress at first but if you keep doing small actions, they will eventually compound and lead to significant results.

03. Consistency:

The key to the compound effect is consistency, you have to make your actions become a regular part of your routine and you start to feel like something is off if you skip them. The consistency builds momentum and create a self-sustaining cycle of success.

another model that works the same way as “the compound effect”

I was already aware of the compound effect and knew how it works, but I still, struggled to follow through on consistent action due to various excuses and obstacles. Building consistent habits and routines takes effort and commitment (I have efforts but no commitment to anything 😀 ) and we are, living in a world that has so many distractions.

How to make it easier?

01 – Let’s focus on the long-term benefits of consistent action and praying that we could commit to it… It’s important to break down big goals into smaller ones, remember “small actions” I mentioned above? Yes, tiny.

02 – It should be something you like or you are forced to do (like showing up at 8 am like me). If you are looking to improve your health by involving physical activities into your daily routine, it is important to find an exercise that you enjoy and feel motivated to do such as cycling, swimming, or even taking a brisk walk around the neighborhood with someone instead of running 10km. Starting with an exercise that you enjoy, you are more likely to stick with it and gradually increase your level of intensity and duration over time.

03 – That would be greater if you have a companion, you will have someone to vibe with during boring activities :> you have another reason to start and to keep doing these activities. It’s okay that you start smaller than everybody does, its okay to start with only 1 minute sooner 🙂

04 – And don’t forget to celebrate small wins: 1 minute sooner or 500m walking is all fine. It helps create a positive feedback loop that reinforces consistent action and makes it easier to stay motivated and focused.

The compound effect can be applied to any subject in life.

Do you not need to earn a lot of money to start saving? Do you need to be proficient in English to start talking with foreigners? Do you need to have extensive knowledge of finance to read about economic crises or bankruptcy events? Most of the time, the answer is no. Starting small and making progress every day is the key. When I began writing in English, my grammar and pronunciation were basic, I just randomly wrote down whats on my mind. When I started reading about economic crises, it was a challenging topic for me to understand, I did it anyway, reading an article per day and consuming short contents so I can easily get the ideas. By making a small effort every day, even if it seems insignificant, the compound effect will eventually take hold, and you will witness a significant improvement in your skills and knowledge.

Yeah, that’s all about. Thank you for reading and I would love to hear kind lovely words from you!

P/s 1: I planned to write this blog in Vietnamese but I can not find a suitable Vietnamese word for “compound effect” so here you are. Enjoy!

P/s 2: There is a book written about this, you can find The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy.