Ever found yourself sticking with something that’s no longer working—just because you’ve already invested so much into it? In this episode of Productivity Hacks, we’re exploring the power of pivoting and how it can save you time, energy, and frustration.
Discover why letting go isn’t failure—it’s a smart strategy to move closer to your goals. I’ll share a personal story about a moment of clarity during a sunrise walk along the stunning Flamborough cliffs and explore the psychology of why pivoting feels so hard (hello, sunk cost fallacy!).
We’ll also unpack the concept of ‘throwing good time after bad’ with relatable examples, from business decisions to books you just couldn’t finish. Whether it’s a minor tweak or a major shift, learning to pivot can unlock new opportunities and productivity.
If you know you need to pivot but feel stuck in procrastination, don’t miss the free download, Stop Stalling: The Ultimate Cheat Sheet to Break the Procrastination Cycle in 1 Minute – a quick and practical tool to help you take action. Download it for free here
Ready to pivot? Tune in now to learn how to stop wasting time and take control of your productivity.
If you want to explore working with me and my latest offers on Productivity Pivot sessions or the Productivity Pioneer program, get in touch on [email protected]
Sometimes, the best way to move forward is to stop, reassess, and change direction. We often think of pivoting as giving up, but in reality, it can be one of the most powerful productivity tools in your arsenal. Learning when to pivot can save time, energy, and stress, allowing you to focus on what truly matters.
We’ve all heard the phrase throwing good money after bad—continuing to spend on something just because we’ve already invested so much. The same thing happens with time. We often push forward with a project, course, or commitment that no longer serves us simply because we’ve already put in so much effort. But is that really the best use of our most valuable resource—our time?
Imagine you’ve paid for a marketing course that promised to transform your business. A few weeks in, you realise the strategies don’t align with your business model. But because you’ve already spent money and time on it, you convince yourself to push through, hoping it will eventually work. Meanwhile, you’re spending even more time and energy on something that isn’t delivering results. Sound familiar?
During a trip to my mum’s in Flamborough, I had a realisation. After a poor night’s sleep, I debated skipping my planned early morning walk. But then it hit me—I was about to waste more time by staying in bed just because I’d wasted time the night before doom-scrolling. I got up, went for that walk, and felt incredible. That moment of clarity made me realise how often we let one poor decision dictate the next.
Why is pivoting so hard? One major reason is the sunk cost fallacy—a psychological bias that makes us feel we need to keep investing in something just because we’ve already started. This shows up in all areas of life:
Work: Holding onto a project that’s not working.
Business: Persisting with a strategy that doesn’t align with your audience.
Personal Life: Finishing a book or series you’re not enjoying just because you’ve already started.
Instead of focusing on what’s already been spent, ask yourself: If I were starting fresh today, would I choose this path? If the answer is no, it’s time to pivot.
Take an honest look at where you’re spending your time and whether it’s bringing you closer to your goals.
Your past efforts were not wasted—they were learning experiences. But they don’t need to dictate your future choices.
Decide what needs to change and outline your next steps. This will make the pivot feel intentional rather than reactive.
The longer you wait, the more difficult it becomes. The sooner you pivot, the more time you’ll save.
Is there something in your life or business that you’re holding onto just because you’ve already started? What could you gain by letting go and choosing a better direction?
If you’re struggling to take action, download my free guide: Stop Stalling: The Ultimate Cheat Sheet to Break the Procrastination Cycle. And if you need support in making a bigger shift, check out my Productivity Pivot Sessions—where we create a plan tailored to you.
Speaker 1:
Hey there and welcome to Productivity Hacks, your go-to podcast for quick hacks to help you to get things done and to do them well. I’m Jasmine, your host, productivity coach and consultant, and my mission is to help people increase their productivity so that they have time for what really matters. Each week, I’ll bring you a short episode packed with tips that you can implement right away to boost your output. So let’s dive in. Hi everyone, and welcome to another episode of Productivity Hacks. I am so glad you’re here.
Speaker 1:
Today we’re diving into one of the most powerful productivity tools that you can have in your arsenal, and that is the ability to pivot. Sometimes, the best way to move forward is to stop, reassess and change direction, even if it feels uncomfortable or it comes with some challenges. Pivoting isn’t always easy, but when we embrace it, it can save us time and energy and a lot of stress in the long run. This concept hit home for me recently, and it all clicked during a trip to my mum’s house in Flamborough on the East Yorkshire coast, and I’ll share more about that in just a moment. But first I want to introduce you to an idea that I’m calling throwing good time after bad. I’m sure you’ve all heard the phrase throwing good money after bad. It’s when we keep pouring money into something that isn’t working because we’ve already spent so much on it, we’re chasing our losses.
Speaker 1:
Let me give you an example that many of you might recognise. I want you to imagine that you’ve spent a thousand pounds on a course say a marketing course to help grow your business. You’ve committed to it because you were excited about learning how to scale and you believed that it was the missing piece. But after a few weeks you start to realise that the course isn’t really helping you. The strategies they’re teaching are outdated or maybe they don’t even align with your business model. You’re busy. You’ve already invested so much time watching the videos and implementing some of the techniques. You don’t want to admit it’s not working. So you keep going telling yourself I’ve already spent £1,000 on this, so I’ve got to make it work. So you keep pushing through. You buy more supplementary materials for the course, hoping that it’ll click. But as time goes on, you’re spending even more money buying tools, hiring additional help to implement the strategies and spending hours and hours working on things that just don’t fit.
Speaker 1:
The problem is, none of this is giving you the return you were hoping for. In fact, you’re actually losing more time and money as you continue to chase after a dead end. This is the classic case of throwing good money after bad. You’re investing more of your time and resources, hoping that the initial investment will somehow pay off, but in reality, it’s only leading to more frustration and less progress. As you can see, with this scenario, throwing good money after bad also extends to time, which is your most valuable resource. We end up chasing losses, throwing more of our precious hours into something, just because we’ve already started.
Speaker 1:
Does that sound familiar? If so, today’s episode is for you. We’re going to talk about how recognising this pattern can save you valuable time and energy and why pivoting, whether in life or business, can be one of the smartest moves you make. We’ll also talk a bit about the psychology behind why pivoting feels so hard but is so necessary. Stick around, because I’ll also share how I pivoted early in my own podcast journey and how that helped me align better with my goals. Plus, I’ve got some exciting opportunities to tell you about, including my productivity pivot sessions and some special Black Friday offers so you can pivot into a more aligned and productive way of working.
Speaker 1:
Okay, so I want to take you back to the summer when I was staying at my mum’s house on the coast of Flamborough. It’s on the east Yorkshire coast in England and if you’ve ever been there you’ll know it’s stunning. There are dramatic cliffs, breathtaking views of the North Sea, and I had this grand plan to get up early one morning and walk along the. I was there child free and knew this was an opportunity to just get up and out without having to sort the kids out or arrange childcare. But the night before I had one of those nights you know the ones didn’t sleep well at all and instead of winding down like I should have, I got sucked into doom scrolling on my phone. Yes, I’m human, it also happens to me and my alarm went off at 6am and I remember groaning I just don’t want to get up. I’m not a morning person anyway, really not.
Speaker 1:
And I started justifying why staying in bed was a good idea. I’m tired, it’s too early, I didn’t sleep well anyway. This is my opportunity for a sleep in. But then a thought hit me. I’m about to throw good time after bad. I’d already wasted time the night before by scrolling instead of sleeping, and now I was about to waste my morning too. Why let a bad night ruin a good day? So I pulled myself out of bed, threw on some warm clothes and I went out for that walk.
Speaker 1:
Pulled myself out of bed, threw on some warm clothes and I went out for that walk and let me tell you, it was magical. The sea, air, the sound of the waves crashing against the cliffs and the golden light of the sunrise it made it all worth it. I got some beautiful pictures, but that walk wasn’t just refreshing. It was a moment of clarity for me. How often do we do this in life or in work, in business? How often do we keep pouring time into something just because we’ve already started, even when it’s clear it’s not working? How often do we throw good time and good money after bad? Sometimes the best thing we can do is stop, pivot and head in a new direction.
Speaker 1:
This idea of pivoting is not new for me. In work and business, I make lots of pivots. I like to be quite agile in business and in fact, I made a big pivot early on in this podcast, after a couple of episodes, because when I first launched Productivity Hacks, my focus was incredibly narrow. I was targeting mums in business who wanted productivity tips and while that’s still a group I love to serve I am that group. I’m a mum in business.
Speaker 1:
I quickly realised that I’d niched too far. It wasn’t easy to admit I’d already invested time. It wasn’t easy to admit I’d already invested time, energy, money into branding, episode content and messaging. It was a bit embarrassing to realise I needed to change direction so soon after starting. And yes, it meant redoing some things, which added more work. But you know what? That pivot was the right move. It allowed me to align my content with a broader audience and a deeper purpose. Now my episodes feel more authentic and I’m reaching people who really resonate with what I have to say. I’m also sure that I’ll pivot in the future again. I’ll think of something else. I’ll think of a better way of doing this.
Speaker 1:
I’m not afraid of a pivot, because pivoting isn’t about failure. It’s about agility. It’s about recognising what’s not working and being brave enough to change course. The quicker we pivot, the more time and energy we save and the closer we get to what truly matters. So why is pivoting so hard? One big reason is something called the sunk cost fallacy. This is a psychological bias where we feel compelled to keep investing in something just because of what we’ve already put into it, whether that’s time, money or effort. Here’s the thing sunk costs are just that they’re sunk, they’re gone. No amount of continued investment will bring them back.
Speaker 1:
But instead of focusing on the future, we often cling to what we’ve already spent, even when it’s clear it’s not working, like my example earlier when you started a course or program to help you grow with your business. You’ve paid for it, blocked out the time for it, made a real effort to stick with it. But a few weeks in you realise it’s not the right fit for you. The content doesn’t resonate, the strategies just don’t align with your business model. Yet you keep going telling yourself I’ve already paid for it, so I might as well finish throwing more time and potentially more money into it. That’s the sunk cost fallacy at work. You’re investing more of your time and energy into something that isn’t serving you just because you’ve already spent money on it. A better approach is to cut your losses, learn what you can from the experience and redirect your focus to something that truly fits your needs. Here’s another example You’ve spent months working on a project, potentially a new product or service for your business.
Speaker 1:
You’ve put your heart into it, maybe even spent a lot on branding, marketing, but when you launch it, the response is lukewarm. Deep down, you know it’s not quite right. It’s not solving the problem that your audience really cares about. Still, you hesitate to pivot, you think. But I’ve already put so much work into this, so you keep tweaking, rebranding, promoting it, hoping to turn things around. Meanwhile, that time and energy could have been spent developing something new that’s better aligned with what your audience wants. And it’s not just about work or business. This bias shows up in everyday life too. Have you ever been halfway through a book or a TV series that you just weren’t enjoying but kept going because you’d already started? In all these scenarios, the rational choice would be to stop pivot, but the sunk cost fallacy tricks us into thinking that we need to keep going to justify our past investments.
Speaker 1:
I’m someone who loves to complete things. I struggled for years with this concept of needing to complete, and I can’t tell you the amount of times I suffered through a series to just drag myself to the end and complete it. You the amount of times I suffered through a series to just drag myself to the end and complete it. I recognised that it was holding me back in terms of reading, which is something I love. I love reading because it’s a really efficient way of learning. Incredible people have downloaded their brain, their research, their businesses into one book that I can read in a matter of hours and gain all that knowledge. However, my insistence on finishing books stopped me from reading altogether, as I didn’t want to carry on with the book that I’d committed to, so I just didn’t read. I experienced so much relief when I let myself off the hook. That book isn’t grabbing. You Put it back on the shelf and pick up another, because maybe one day it will. Atomic Habits was one of those. For whatever reason, it just wasn’t holding my attention at first. Perhaps I wasn’t in the right frame of mind, so I shelved it. I came back to it about six months later and it is now one of the most read and referenced books on my shelves.
Speaker 1:
The key to overcoming this sunk cost fallacy is to focus on future outcomes instead of past investments. Let yourself off the hook. Ask yourself if I was starting fresh today, knowing what I know now, would I choose this path? If the answer is no, it’s time for a pivot. Pivoting isn’t about giving up. It’s about being smart. It’s about valuing your future, time and energy more than your past efforts. And the sooner you pivot, the less time, money, energy you’ll have to invest in something that’s no longer serving you. Just think about the things that you should have stopped in the past, the things that were no longer serving you and your business, your work, the projects that you knew were not going to work, but you just carried on because you’d already invested so much time. Maybe you’ve even convinced others to invest lots of time into it. When I think about my own journey, like pivoting, the focus of this podcast it’s clear to me that that discomfort of change is only temporary, but the benefits of alignment last so much longer. So, whether it’s a small adjustment or a big shift, being willing to pivot opens up space for growth and progress, and it is extremely productive.
Speaker 1:
So let me ask you, where in your life, your work, your business, might you need to pivot? Your work, your business might you need to pivot? Is there a project, a goal or even a mindset that you’re holding on to just because you’ve already put time into it? What could you gain by letting go and changing direction? If you know, a pivot is what you need, but you find yourself procrastinating over actually making the move.
Speaker 1:
I’ve got something that can help my free download Stop Stalling. The ultimate cheat sheet to break the procrastination cycle in just one minute is designed to guide you out of indecision and into action. It’s a quick, practical tool to help you identify what’s holding you back and take that all-important first step. Identify what’s holding you back and take that all important first step. You can download it at zestproductivitycom or link in the show notes. If you’re ready to explore a pivot with some extra support, my productivity pivot sessions are perfect for this. We’ll work together to identify what’s not working, clarify your priorities and create a plan to move forward with confidence and purpose.
Speaker 1:
For those looking for deeper, long-term productivity transformation, my Productivity Pioneer Programme offers six months of coaching where we dive deep into creating sustainable systems, tackling big goals and finding your flow. And if you’re listening, during Black Friday week 2024, I have some incredible offers, including half price on my pivot session and £200 off my pioneer program. There will never be this price again. Head over to the links in my show notes to learn more about how you can save while investing in a more aligned and productive way of working or send me a message. Just email me at jasmine at zestproductivitycom. Remember, pivoting isn’t about giving up. It’s about choosing the best path forward. Download the procrastination guide book, a productivity pivot session, or explore the pioneer program whatever feels like the right next step for you.
Speaker 1:
Thanks so much for tuning in. I can’t wait to hear how you’re embracing the power of a pivot in your own life. See you next week, where I will be exploring how to prepare productively for a successful time off so you can switch off, relax and know that you’re leaving things in a good place for your return. See you then. That’s it for today. Thank you for tuning into the Productivity Hacks podcast with me, jasmine. What is your action point today? Write it down and make time to do it. If you like what you’ve heard, follow this podcast to get notifications of the weekly episodes and please, please, share it with your friends.
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