About Michael Hyatt

As leaders, we must remain humble. If we don’t, we risk large-scale, public failures that will have a catastrophic, negative impact on the people we are trying to lead.

When I was a young executive I had a level of stamina that was nearly supernatural. I could get locked onto a goal and not eat, not sleep, just stay focused on it until I achieved it. But as I recently told my friends Ian Cron and Suzanne Stabile on their excellent The Road Back […]

Elon Musk is widely regarded as one of the most influential entrepreneurs working today. He’s one of the founders of PayPal and the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. He wants to help put a colony on Mars and be buried there. Because Musk is considered such a visionary, many people want to learn his methods […]

Have you ever found yourself feeling like you have too much work and not enough margin? The good news is that it can change. Here are seven strategies I am following.

Many people feel trapped in a job they hate but don’t believe they can quit. They feel stuck and, as a result, their life is miserable. Do you know someone like this?

On a recent Catalyst Podcast , Andy Stanley said, “The best thing a leader can bring to his team is his energy” (quoting Bill Hybels). … The good news is that you can be a more energetic leader by becoming more aware and intentional about developing it.

If you are a leader, you are going to attract critics. It is inevitable. In fact, if you are’t attracting critics, you should be wondering why. Criticism is normal.

Leaders frequently tell me they have a hard time recruiting great people to join their organizations. When I ask about their hiring process, I often find one missing element: sales. Recruiting great people is similar to any kind of sales process. Your company is the product. Prospective employees are your customers. The recruiting process is […]

If you’re in a position of leadership, chances are better than good you’re going to blow it with your people sooner or later. It’s like messing things up in your marriage. Don’t ask me how I know this, but it’s inevitable from time to time. There are pluses and minuses to that comparison, but one […]

I am not the first person to make this observation, but it is worth repeating. Too often, I meet young leaders are frustrated because they can’t control every aspect of the process. If only the sales department reported to me, I could improve my results.“

Productivity doesn’t just increase your efficiency. If you do it right, it can also increase your income. The problem is that traditional systems get productivity all wrong. They define productivity as the ability to do more and do it faster. But that approach just accelerates the hamster wheel we’re already on. Instead of getting ahead, […]

Is it just me, or is our modern work culture bleeding us dry? It’s not just our cell phones and computer screens that draw our eyes at all hours. As much as we might want to blame technology, the root of our struggle to have satisfactory days goes much deeper. Far too often, we think, […]

We all know that sitting for long periods of time isn’t good for our bodies. Standing boosts our energy and our mood. That’s why I use and recommend a standup desk. But there’s more to it than more time on your feet. It’s also important to get those feet moving. Our bodies just aren’t designed to […]

The fear of missing out isn’t worth much, but FOMO costs us a lot. That’s especially true when it comes to our productivity. It’s like a powerful undertow, invisible on the surface of our work, which can pull us away in the current. Right after I left as CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers, an online […]

Email is indispensable. But it can feel like a necessary evil for a lot of us. Our inboxes are flooded with information and requests from customers, clients, coworkers, friends, and family. Not to mention all the spam, BACN, and random junk. I’ve seen inboxes with tens of thousands of emails—hundreds, even thousands unread. People feel […]

When I think of one word to describe contemporary work habits, it’s unsustainable. We’re working drastically longer hours, while incurring high physical and emotional costs, for only marginal gains in productivity. We created this infographic to illustrate some interesting (and surprising) stats on our struggle with productivity in the modern workplace. Feel free to share […]

To some people, ritual is a bad word. Many folks recoil at the religious association, even though most rituals aren’t religious. For others, the thought of following set, predetermined actions makes them feel boxed in. But rituals are inescapable. We are creatures of memory and habit. The only question is whether our rituals are intentional […]

When it comes to setting personal or professional goals, how do you determine what makes your list? We’re often tempted to commit to important or urgent tasks that have been nagging us for a while. But that’s a mistake. A woman in our 5 Days to Your Best Year Ever private Facebook group faced this […]

Every year comes freshly stocked with 104 weekend days. That’s 28 percent of all available days in the year. It’s like a full quarter! The trouble is that we treat our weekends like a slush fund to bankroll more work. We’re forfeiting a tremendous amount of time we could invest in better uses. Almost a […]

I’m a fairly conservative person but not when it comes to setting new goals for myself or for my business. We may think setting conservative goals is wise, but it actually makes us and our teams less productive. Too many leaders believe they’ll accomplish more if they lower the bar and set goals they can […]

Did you skip lunch last week—either by gobbling down something at your desk or forgoing food altogether? The odds are good that you did. A 2012 workplace survey by Right Management found just one in five employees take actual lunch breaks. That’s a problem because both the lunch and the break are good for you.

We’re several weeks into the new year at this point. If you set some significant goals, you might be feeling the challenge of sticking with them. That’s especially true if you’ve got a bad habit holding you back. Do you have a habit you’re struggling to break? Sometimes it can feel impossible. We’ve all been […]

I’m a serious reader and have been most of my life. Most leaders I know are. We realize there’s a major ROI on time dedicated to reading. As I’ve blogged about before, reading makes us better thinkers, improves our people skills, and helps us master communication—not to mention the rest and rejuvenation it offers. We […]

When I coach people on reaching their goals, I advise them to be flexible on their strategies. The goal might be sacred, but we can change strategies as often as we need. But that’s not a blanket endorsement of flexibility. In fact, flexibility can significantly damage our productivity if we’re not careful. How?