Set your watch five minutes early

It’s a tiny thing but it sure can make a significant difference to your life.

First of all it reduces your stress levels. Instead of rushing to make it to meetings, you’re far more likely to arrive on time, even if you’re delayed a little.

Secondly, it’s always notable when someone arrives a few minutes early for a meeting. It implies keenness and good organisational ability – two attributes that are prized by everyone successful in the business world.

Develop your vocabulary

The ability to communicate powerfully is absolutely crucial to success in today’s world and, of course, the basic instruments of

communication are words.

So any time spent building a powerful vocabulary is time spent well indeed.

I am constantly amazed at how people are impressed when they hear someone use unusual words. I think very often they mistake an extensive vocabulary for high intelligence! The two don’t necessarily go together, of course, but if that’s what people think then take advantage of it.

Aim to learn a word a week and soon your vocabulary will be rich, powerful and varied.

Give small gifts often.

When you go somewhere for dinner, give the hosts a small gift. Seeing a good friend? Bring along a little present. Meeting up with your lover? Take along a little flower or trinket.

People remember gifts. They appreciate them, it makes them feel special.

A little gift costs you virtually nothing, but the impact you make can be enormous.

Remember, the people who really get on in this world are the people who can make others feel special.

Buy three expensive ties or scarves

Good ties (and scarves on women) get noticed.

When people see somebody wearing a beautiful tie or scarf, they often assume the rest of their clothes are expensive too. (Even if you got them from Matalan.

They also often assume that the tie or scarf wearer is successful, intelligent and stylish.

Now, as we all know, very often none of these things is true! But you’d be mad not to give yourself the advantage of making a good first impression, and a beautiful tie or scarf will do that for almost anyone.

Spend half an hour a day thinking

That’s right, just thinking.

Sadly, most people do virtually no quality thinking in a year let alone a day.

As Henry Ford said, ‘Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably why so few engage in it.’

Most fortunes start with a great idea, and a lot of hard work. Most people have got the hard work bit right, they just didn’t spend long enough thinking of the right idea.

The founder of IBM, Thomas Watson, had signs put up around his company that said just one word: ‘Think’!!!

Have the shiniest shoes

Few people worry about them, but superbly shined shoes can make a real impression. Immaculately kept footwear says a lot about a person.  It says:

1.  They care about their personal presentation.

2.  They are concerned about details.

3.  They’re organised enough to have time to polish their shoes.

4.  They have personal pride.

Are these attributes of successful people?  You bet.

But there’s another benefit to well maintained footwear. You feel great wearing superbly presented shoes, and when you feel great, you usually perform well too.

Throw out half of what you own

Half the clothes you own you rarely wear. Half the possessions you have you either never use or place little value on.

Make the decision to keep only what’s beautiful or really useful.

It may seem a radical thing to do, but the rewards are significant. You’ll have a cleaner environment, your dry cleaning bills will be lower, you’ll be able to find things more easily, and you’ll value what you’ve got left much more.

And if you give it all to the poor, you’ll also feel really good inside.

Assume too good to be true deals aren’t

It’s true, probably a couple of times in your life you’ll get offered an incredible, no brainer way to make money.

The problem is knowing whether it’s legit, because 90% of the time they aren’t.

A far better way to make money is to go for good deals (not amazing ones) that require less investment and do more of them.

That way you spread your risk over a number of deals, and considerably increase your chance of making an overall profit.

Always keep a note pad with you

Ever come up with a great idea, and then forgotten it before you wrote it down? Me too, numerous times.

The trick to not losing these gems of inspiration is to always carry a small pad and pen. That way, when you have a good thought, you can quickly jot it down on the spot.

The founder of IMG, the largest sports management company in the world, is Mark McCormack. Mark uses this same method, but instead of carrying a small pad, he keeps some small white cards in his pocket. Quite often he pens down some thoughts and gives them straight to one of his staff.

Me? I keep a tiny digital recorder under my car seat. Any ideas I have while driving I just record then and there, then give the device to my PA when I arrive at work.