New year, new you.

Habits are hard to break.

New habits are notoriously difficult to build, too.?

Conventional wisdom allows 21 days to form a habit. For some, it takes up to sixty-six days for the behavior to become automatic.? Yet, when the quirks of celestial orbits dictate, we make New Year's resolutions to break our old habits and create a cleaner, fitter, healthier version of ourselves. It's the feast period for gym memberships, planners, and organizers; we promise to visit, store, and declutter. We set resolutions to be better, and this time, we will really, really stick to them.

Here are six resolutions to pick up and improve how you work, lead, and communicate.

Put gen AI in your toolkit.

If you thought the Gen AI hype train was slowing down, think again. It's as likely gen AI will continue its breakneck pace into 2024. Here's a primer on AI, how it works, and what ChatGPT itself describes as “a brilliant distillation of the essence of AI prompt engineering” and an? “essential tool for the digital age.”?

Plus, a handy, dandy guide.

Trust the T in teamwork.

High-performing teams are built on trust. But it's one of those tricky, you-know-what-it's-like-when-you-have-it, but can't-quite-describe how-to-get-there words. Here's an explanation of trust for you to consider and how to build it on your team.

Bring back “But.”

I know; you went on a training course about conflicted communication, and someone told you to reply with “And...” when you're about to add your point of view.?

But don't discount the power of “But.”?

It's one of three little words that can improve your storytelling and crispen your critical thinking.

Discover “But” and two other useful words.

Tell stories to lead change.

All management is change management. If you lead, you lead change. This year will be no different. You don't need to recruit more change managers or hire (ahem) outside consultants; you can lead change.

Change will always be hard; it will always be messy. But you can make it a little bit less messy if you tell seven stories to lead change.

Fix your meetings.

Last year, you had too many meetings. Look at your calendar now. You probably have more on there than you would like. You can do better; you can have less. And the meetings you do have can be better, too.?

Here's how.

Be better.

We have been celebrating New Year’s, fresh starts and making promises to be better since the time of the ancient Babylonians.? It’s called a growth mindset, and it doesn’t have to wait until New Year.

Here are some tactics to “Be Better” and help your team “Be Better” that you can pick up and use anytime.

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If you have read this far... Thank you.

My New Year’s resolution is to grow the readership of this newsletter. Comment with your thoughts on this article and ideas on what you would like to see in future episodes; share the article with colleagues, and if you haven’t yet, please subscribe.

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Gavin.

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Shameless plug.

If you'd like to find out more about fassforward's work, helping organizations and teams transform through #leadership and #storytelling, visit fassforward.com

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Shout out.

The incomparable Eugene Yoon does many of the illustrations for this newsletter and all the ones in this article. She is amazing.

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Worth the time.

Fast Company did a great digest on making and keeping New Year’s resolutions.?

A study from Nature on why we procrastinate. Hint: our brains somehow trick us into thinking (really feeling) that it will be less effort if we do it later.