If you can make small increases in performance in lots of different areas, you’ll make a huge difference in overall terms. This principal of ‘marginal gains’, coined by Sir Dave Brailsford, the leader of the Sky Pro Cycling team in the UK, has been used to great success in sports as well as other areas of life and business.

Think about a target such as getting up earlier in order to achieve more. Break it down into the things that affect sleep and make a plan around changing your actions and behaviour in these areas, e.g. don’t drink caffeine after a certain time in the evening, don’t take your devices to the bedroom with you, switching them off so you are not disturbed and create a time that you stick to religiously as your absolute maximum for being in bed and asleep.

The results on a task like this can be huge. It may sound a bit dull, especially with an example such as this, but the outputs from sports performance are incredible and if you apply this principle to your own work or life it can have a huge impact.