This article is based on the closing keynote I delivered at the The Securities and Investment Management Association (SIMA)’s (SIMA) Annual Leadership Conference on October 15, 2025. You can find Part 1 here.
The Most Efficient Use of Willpower: Habit Formation
If willpower is scarce and easily eroded, relying on a brute-strength approach (trying to make big changes stick through sheer willpower) is bound to be highly ineffective. The solution is to work upstream: gradually build up your willpower and deploy it towards developing the habitsthat will help you thrive.
As Baumeister explains, “Self-control turned out to be most effective when people used it to establish good habits and break bad ones.” (Baumeister, 2012) This is not a new idea. As Aristotle wrote 2500 years ago, “by acting with discipline we develop self-discipline, and by performing brave acts we develop bravery”. Behaviours, after repeated performance, become so ingrained that they seem like a permanent quality of our character. (Hall, 2019)
Judo founder Jigoro Kano stressed this point, writing that you must endeavor to cultivate good habits on a daily basis because “even if you intend to do good, if you have not developed the habit of doing so, your best intentions will easily be corrupted.” (Kano, 2005)
Habits, whether good or bad, are mutually reinforcing. But contrary to bad habits that rely on self-indulgence or expediency, developing good habits requires time and willpower.
Martial arts like judo are famous for developing discipline, self-control, and habits. But how does it work?
To progress in judo, you must accept that it is a practice as Alasdair McIntyre defined it. It’s not just about the fun stuff: spectacular throws, armlocks, and chokes. It involves “standards of excellence and obedience to rules.” (MacIntyre, 2007) What this means is that a student who wants to progress must therefore work on aspects that seem, initially, less important to them; aspects such as posture, attire, etiquette, and more. Many of the benefits pertaining to self-discipline and habit formation lie, in fact, in such aspects of the practice.
Why are those habits so important? Because they serve as the foundation for building the self-discipline required to tackle larger goals – like getting your black belt, or getting ready for that big tournament. Consider one small example, such as folding my gi properly after washing it. I couldn’t dream of throwing my gi in a ball in a corner. In fact, I think it would actually hurt to do so! But many things that are simply part of me now used to be a real challenge when I started judo at age 11 and served to develop my own discipline over time.
Even seemingly small aspects of the practice help judokas develop their discipline. Here are just a few:
- Posture: According to Kyuzo Mifune, sitting correctly in the seiza position “leads to a clear and relaxed mental state.” Beyond the dojo, studies have shown that concentrating on changing a habitual behavior such as poor posture can surprisingly improve overall willpower. As Baumeister writes: “Unexpectedly, the best results [in experiments] came from the group working on posture.” (Baumeister, 2012)
- Etiquette: Bowing in martial arts is not a formality; it’s an expression of gratitude and respect. Jigoro Kano stated that you are thanking your opponent for the opportunity to improve your technique. Proper decorum is essential in martial arts because it is one of the ways we ensure the safety of all practitioners in the dojo.
- Punctuality: Being on time is another small, controllable habit that trains discipline and demonstrates respect towards training partners.
A Flywheel Effect for Restoring Balance
How can you begin to implement this system in your own life? First and foremost, avoid brute strength, “hard” approaches like trying to go too big, too fast, through some massive and unsustainable effort of self-control. This is a gradual process, like getting your black belt.
The key to restoring balance through habits is to embrace a systematic, gradual approach:
- Pick a small thingthat will help you build your self-control, like improving posture or focusing on punctuality. “The key is to concentrate on changing a habitual behavior.” (Baumeister, 2012)
- Once that small thing has become a habit, move on to the next one.
- As you exercise your self-discipline, those small things will start to build up—like the flywheel effectthat Jim Collins described twenty-five years ago, but applied at the individual level.
As Collins noted, good-to-great transformations never happen in one fell swoop; the process is like relentlessly pushing a giant, heavy flywheel, building momentum until a point of breakthrough.
In that spirit, you should set short-term process goals (e.g., bowing before stepping onto the mats) as well as long-term ambitious goals (e.g., getting my black belt in the next seven years). Gradually move up to bigger goals, such as going to bed earlier, going to the gym three times per week, or carving out an hour a day to read or think strategically about the business. Initially, some of these small things will require a lot of willpower. But as they get ingrained, a point will come when they no longer do.
Over the years, I’ve defined and maintained a series of habits that have helped me maximize the time I spend in my own Zone of Maximum Effectiveness. Here are a few:
- Getting up early and always around the same time.
- Having a set morning routine, which includes reading my paper.
- Going to the office every day (with the music on!).
- Carving out meeting-free time slots and protecting them aggressively.
- Working on only one thing at a time and blocking out all distractions (e.g. ignoring emails and Teams during focused work).
- Always eating lunch, and always away from my desk.
- Setting time slots aside for important things like thinking, reading, and business development.
- Not working from home when the day is over.
- Going to the dojo three times per week, at set times.
- Going to bed early.
Taken together, these habits form a personal system that requires very little mental energy to maintain. The system covers aspects of diet, sleep, exercise, and cognitive health essential for high performance. Although it reduces the total time available for work every day, the quality and efficiency of the work performed are significantly higher. And by having so many things on auto-pilot, I free up scarce willpower and other cognitive resources for when it’s truly needed.
Letting Go of Outcomes
Finally, to operate with maximum efficiency, we must adopt the martial arts mindset of focusing on the process, not the outcome. Fixating on outcomes, like winning a tournament or hitting a sales quota, can induce stress and anxiety, ultimately stifling creativity and performance.
Instead, focus on controllable process goals. This focus improves skills, self-efficacy, and concentration, while reducing cognitive anxiety. (Kee, 2021) As sport psychologist Terry Orlick instructs, “Win by removing all thoughts of winning. Simply connect and trust the connection. Relax. Attack by relaxing”. (Orlick, 2015) This mirrors the concept of Mushin(no-mind) in Zen and traditional martial arts, where the mind is free from conscious thought and ego, allowing for spontaneous, fluid action.
Trying to achieve efficiency by cracking the whip on yourself or ratcheting up pressure is counter-productive. Instead, deploy your willpower to establish the good habits that will naturally lead to bigger results and higher performance over time. You want to achieve big things? Start with the small ones.
The Final Word
Always remember that you are your own instrument and that the most important victories are the ones you achieve over yourself. That is not a selfish view, by the way, because the work you do on yourself will inevitably have an impact far beyond yourself. Imagine the positive organizational benefits if everyone became “a little better every day” at everything we’ve seen above. Once you understand the immense benefits that come from having a balanced, highly effective approach, you will inevitably want it for everyone in your circle of influence. You can become an inspiring example for others, one of the marks of good leadership.
Part of my work as an executive coach involves leveraging what I have learned from judo to help my clients achieve their goals. The key takeaway for today is this: start small, build your willpower, leverage that willpower to build good habits, and gradually move from the seemingly insignificant to the substantial while remaining flexible and adapting to circumstances.
You have agency—you can choose to act. At the very least, you can choose to try!
Sources:
Aristotle. How to Flourish: Selections from the Nicomachean Ethics. Selected, translated, and introduced by Susan Sauvé Meyer. Princeton University Press, Princeton and Oxford, 2023, 302 pages.
Baumeister, Roy. F., and Tierney, John. Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength. The Penguin Press, New York, 2012, 304 pages.
Hall, Edith. Aristotle’s Way: How Ancient Wisdom Can Change Your Life. Penguin Press, New York, 2019, 272 pages.
Kano, Jigoro. Mind Over Muscle: Writings From the Founder of Judo. Kodansha International, Tokyo, 2005, 155 pages.
Kee, Ying Hwa and al. The wuwei alternative: Effortless action and non-striving in the context of mindfulness practice and performance in sport. Asian Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology 1 (2021) 122–132
Levitin, Daniel J. The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload. Penguin Canada, 2015, 528 pages.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory, Third Edition. University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, Indiana, 2007, 286 pages.
Mifune, K. (2004). The Canon of Judo: Classic Teachings on Principles and Techniques. Translated by Françoise White. Tokyo, Kodansha International, 224 pages.
Orlick, T (2015). In pursuit of excellence: How to Win in Sport and Life Through Mental Training. Human Kinetics, Fifth Edition, 384 pages. (Kindle Edition)
