I have a quick story I want to share with you.
On Monday of this week I walked into the bathroom on our main floor of our house and this is what I immediately saw:
What I saw at my house…
Now, I know I’m not the only person who has seen this image before. And I clearly know I’m not responsible for doing this, which means there is only one person left who is guilty (you know who).
Anyway, as I was going to the bathroom (sorry to be so graphic but there is a lesson at the end of the story!), I was thinking, “how do you get a person to consistently change a roll of toilet paper each and every time without nagging them?” The answer didn’t immediately come to me so I kept that thought in the back of my head and moved on with my day.
Yesterday I went to my parent’s house because I was taking my mom out to lunch. The first thing I did when I got to their house was go to the bathroom. When I went to the bathroom, the first thing I saw was this:
What I saw at my parent’s house….
When I saw this, it was like a light bulb went off in my head. The answer to my question (how to get a person to consistently change a roll of toilet paper without nagging them) immediately came to mind!
The answer is to make the system ridiculously EASY that it’s hard NOT to do.
Take this “toilet paper” example, in the first picture, you have to remove a “hard to remove bar” to replace the toilet paper roll. This requires effort! In some cases, too much effort!
But in the second picture, all you do is slide out the old toilet paper roll to slide in the new toilet paper roll. It’s ridiculously easy that it’s actually harder to NOT change the roll and instead use your “Jenga” skills to stack the new roll on top!
Problem solved.
The lesson here or “tip to remember” is to keep your organizing systems easy to follow. If something isn’t working for you (or others in your house), ask yourself “how can I simplify this system to make it easier to follow and/or use?”
After all, when things are easy, they got done. When things are hard, they get procrastinated and/or never done. Sometimes a simple change can make a world of a difference 🙂
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