69. Top 10 Executive Function Skills You Need in the Real World (And How to Build Them If You Don't Have Them)
Episode 69
In this episode, I break down the 10 executive function skills you need to operate independently—at school, at work, and in life. These aren’t just student skills. These are life skills that help you start tasks, manage your time, regulate your emotions, stay organized, and follow through on goals.
Without these 10 executive function skills, your professional career is going to be so much harder than it needs to be.
What You’ll Learn:
✅ What each executive function looks like in the real world
✅What it looks like when you don’t have the skill
✅How to build and support each one—especially if you have ADHD or executive dysfunction
🎙️Other Episodes + Resources Mentioned
Episode 09: 3 Most Important Areas to Organize
Episode 28: 6 Tips for Organizing Papers
Episode 41: 100 Organization Tips (Part 1)
Episode 42: 100 Organization Tips (Part 2)
Episode 59: ADHD Organization Tips
Episode 35: Executive Function Coaching
Episode 37: How to Accept Feedback
✏️Enroll in SchoolHabits University (Curious? Check it out!)
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The following transcript was autogenerated and may contain some interesting and silly errors. But in the name of efficiency and productivity, I am choosing not to spend my time fixing them 😉
69 Top 10 Executive Functions You Need in the Real World (And How to Build Them If You Don't Have Them)===
[00:00:00] You are smart, you care, you're trying. But no matter what you do, you're always feeling behind, late or overwhelmed. You're turning in work projects at the last minute. You're forgetting that there was a meeting this afternoon. Just scrambling to take notes at the meeting, but don't really know how, and then you zoned out for 30 minutes when you were supposed to be working on something due at the end of the day. Let me repeat: you're smart, you care, and you're trying. So what is going on? Great question. And the answer likely has to do with executive functions. Executive function skills are not just for kids or for students.
They're life skills that affect how well we function at work and home and relationships, and literally anywhere. Now, most people are never explicitly taught executive function skills, but once you understand them and can name them, you can build them.
In this episode, I'm walking you through 10 essential executive function skills, and I'm showing you exactly how each one [00:01:00] shows up in the real world and in the professional space.
I am by profession and education and executive function coach, and I've been teaching these very specific skills for just about two decades. In episode 35, I dive deep into what executive function coaching looks like, so you can determine for yourself if that's something that you would benefit from.
Quick disclaimer, the point of this episode is not to solicit work, as my wait list is impossibly long, but I'm just recommending that episode because I know that many people have found it helpful.
Today we are gonna talk about 10 executive functions. I am going to name what they are, show you what it looks like when you don't have the skills, show you what it looks like when you do have the skills, and then share some tips for how you can support yourself as you continue to develop these skills.
If you are listening today and you have ADHD, this one is for you. Let's begin.
[00:02:00]
So I think it makes sense to start with a simple definition of what executive function skills are. Executive function skills are a constellation of cognitive skills that allow us to operate independently. And don't worry, I am gonna break that definition down with more examples than you could ever imagine, okay? But when I say that these skills allow us to operate independently, I'm talking about these are the skills that enable us to plan and manage our time, and organize our thoughts and our spaces and our things. These are the skills that are connected to impulse control and emotional regulation and task management and learning.
Reaching our [00:03:00] goals. Now, a certain part of our brain, the prefrontal cortex is the area of our brain that is primarily responsible for executive functioning. Now, no spec, no part of the brain fully works in isolation. Okay. So there are definitely other parts of the brain at play here, but the prefrontal cortex is certainly running the show when it comes to executive functions.
Now, people who are neurodivergent, maybe have ADHD or autism spectrum disorder have atypical neurobiology that impacts a few different areas of the brain, including the prefrontal cortex. And this means that people with A DHD often have executive function deficits. Now people with A DHD and other NeuroD divergencies don't as easily develop these skills through trial and error and observation and sort of figure it out as you go, as neurotypical people do.
Okay. But also many people without A DHD also have lesser developed executive [00:04:00] functions, and in these cases, the skill deficit is more due to a lack of just ever being taught these skills, or even over scaffolding in like elementary school, middle school, high school. Okay. What does that tell us? Well, that tells us that executive function skills are absolutely teachable.
In fact, that's literally why I have a company. And a course School Habits University and an educational curriculum, school Habits University for educators that teaches executive function skills because they are teachable skills that anybody can learn. In a perfect world, people will learn executive function skills early on in school, and then these executive function skills will enable students to learn better and learn independently and manage a course load and their time and their tasks and all the things. And then again, we're in this perfect world.
When those students enter the workforce, they further hone their executive function skills to be able to operate independently and succeed in a professional space. Now this is all fine and good, but what happens when [00:05:00] someone does not learn these executive function skills, either due to neurodivergence or a lack of situational exposure?
I mean like being taught it, right, whatever. Well, they end up in, you know, the workforce, they're overwhelmed, scrambling to complete tasks on time, forgetting deadlines, and generally feeling like they're drowning. And the obvious solution here is to learn these executive function skills early on. But if you're listening to this right now and you're like, well, that ship has sailed.
I'm an adult, or I am like in college, or I'm in the workforce, don't worry. That's what today's episode is. We are gonna talk about 10 of these critical skills. I call them critical, because without these skills, it's really hard to function fully and independently and efficiently in any true capacity that leads to somebody
reaching their academic and their personal and their professional goals. So by that measurements, yes, they are indeed critical. I, we've done a lot of good [00:06:00] scrambling, but I feel like if I didn't give you a definition of executive function skills and why they mattered so much and all of that, then you'd probably tune out by now.
So now you hopefully have bought into the fact that these are some of the most critical skills that anybody could ever have. Okay. And we are gonna start with number one, which is task initiation. These aren't in any order of like ranked of like most important, but we are just starting with number one, task initiation.
That is one of the primary executive functions. Task initiation is the ability to get started on a task, preferred or non-preferred, without excessive procrastination or delay. If somebody struggles with task initiation, they're sitting on a pile of emails that they know they need to reply to, but they just can't seem to do it.
They're avoiding the hard conversations, even though they know they're critical to a relationship. They're, you know, never starting that personal project even though they've been dreaming of it for years.At work, it's s knowing that you have a project due and a team that is depending on you, but you will literally do anything other than start the thing. [00:07:00] And keep this in mind.
Task initiation goes hand in hand with task endurance. Sometimes you will hear people talk about task initiation and task endurance together as if they're super connected. But I honestly teach these two skills separately, despite their several su um, subtle overlap because it requires one set of mental skills and strategies to start a task and another set, uh, set to stay focused on it.
Okay, that's concentration and focus, and I talk about that in other episodes. I'll link everything below. But here we are talking about starting something from square one. And as I said, people with A DHD or executive dysfunction often find it nearly impossible to start a task, especially if it's non-preferred, something you don't wanna do.
A strategy that can work for task initiation is to use micro starts. Now, this obviously depends on what the task is that you're avoiding, but here's what it looks like in real life. Let's say you look at your task management system and you see that you have to [00:08:00] turn in a project by Friday. Okay. You were assigned to this project last Friday.
Today is Wednesday and you haven't started yet. You have a lot of feelings, a lot of resistance, a lot of rationalization by like about why you can't start the project or that it's just because you have other things to do and yada yada. The mental chatter can be so very loud in these moments with someone who struggles with task initiation, but when that resistance comes up, here's what you do.
You pause and you name it. Naming a duck a duck can be a very powerful step one in developing executive functions. So you say to yourself, I need to do this thing and I'm resisting doing it. I need to do this thing, and I have a Grammy level narrative about why I shouldn't have to do it.
Okay? You admit this to yourself. You may also feel shame and embarrassment in all kinds of layers of feelings. That's super hard to deal with, but it's also super normal, okay? The feelings are gonna come up, but what you do is you name them. [00:09:00] In this pause, all you are doing is naming them, naming whatever you feel.
And then after you pause and you name a duck a duck, you think of just one simple step that you can take in the next five minutes that would take less than five minutes to do. Okay? But that would move you forward toward the task. I'm gonna repeat that strategy. You think of a task that you can do in the next five minutes that will take five minutes or less.
Five and five. Okay, so if you have a project due, um, by Friday and you haven't started, and it is Wednesday, a task you could do in the next five minutes that takes you less than five minutes to do is opening up a Google Doc and naming it the name of the project. Boom. Now you have started, and I can't tell you how many times that I will walk a professional client through this strategy and they will think it is too insignificant and silly to be effective, and then we check in the next week or the week after and they're like, uh, Katie.
It worked. I'm like, yeah, [00:10:00] you lower the barrier to entry when you can lower the barrier to the first micro task. All right. Another strategy to support task initiation is to add novelty, especially when the task already has urgency. I say this a lot, but novelty and urgency- the two primary ingredients of like starting something and initiation.
Novelty is newness. Um, so sometimes urgency alone though, isn't enough to get you through, uh, to start a task. You know, the thing is due, the clock is ticking, but urgency without stimulation, still not motivating for someone with ADHD or executive dysfunction. And that's where novelty comes in. The brain loves newness, a change in environment, a shift in tools or even a fresh um, like a sensory input can trick your brain into engaging with a task long enough to start it. Let me give you some examples. Let's say that you've been avoiding drafting an email to a client, even though you need to send it before the end of the day, and like you know that. You've been staring at your [00:11:00] computer in the same chair, in the same spot with the same coffee cup for hours.
Okay? You could move to a new location, maybe to your porch, maybe to a conference room, maybe even just standing at the kitchen counter. You don't have to finish the email there, but the change of scene often provides just enough novelty to activate the brain. Or maybe you've been putting off reading a report for your manager.
Maybe you could try switching from reading it on your computer to printing it out and annotating it with highlighters and sticky notes. Suddenly now it's tactile, it's fresh. Your brain gets the dopamine kick that it needs to initiate. You could also add novelty by using a fun pen. This is like really minor, but this stuff works.
A different font in your document. Light a candle that you've never used to change the olfactory environment. Your nose right, open a blank slide deck instead of a Google doc to brainstorm ideas or start your project just just for something different. Again, the goal isn't to finish the task right then and there.
It's just to spark [00:12:00] just enough engagement to get over that hump of starting. Then once you're over the hump, you can either take it from there or tap into some task endurance strategies to get you to the finish line. All right. The second executive function skill required for the real world is planning.
Planning is the ability to break down future tasks into distinct steps and to create a pathway to get from A to B. Okay. It could be something as short term as planning your time so that you have enough time to eat lunch, uh, in a few hours. Okay. And then mapping out what you're going to eat and how long it's gonna take to prepare it before you have to leave the house.
It could be something like planning a vacation or a wedding and knowing all of the different steps involved and how to make sure that they happen in the right sequence and by the right time. It could be the ability to sit down on a Sunday afternoon and plan out your week by looking at all of the things coming down the pipeline and assessing where you're gonna do all these things and whether you can in the first place.[00:13:00]
The ability to plan literally infiltrates every single part of our lives as students, as workers, and just as people with goals. When someone lacks planning skills, they often over schedule and double book. They forget how long tasks have taken in the past and therefore don't accurately predict how long tasks will take the next time they have to do them.
They might have trouble figuring out how to write an essay from beginning to end. They may struggle to get out the door in time for dinner reservation 'cause they misjudge the timing of their yoga class and how long it would take get take to get back home and shower. And suddenly they're in downward dog somewhere realizing that they're supposed to meet someone at a restaurant in 15 minutes.
If you lack planning skills, it can feel nearly impossible to get where you wanna go. And if you think about it, that is at its most fundamental level, goal setting.
Let me give you an example I see a lot in high school students headed to college. I'll be working with someone on their college essay right in the summer between junior and senior year, and we'll be building out their college application and their [00:14:00] student resume, and I'm looking at their activities in their resume wondering like, what, what are we putting on here?
What have you done over the past three and a half years to build your college application? Sometimes these students look at me and they're like, well, I didn't think about it, about college applications until now. Now this isn't always the student's fault. Sometimes there is a lack of education and support, which is just outside of my point here.
But my point is that going to college requires significant planning from freshman year. Starting in ninth grade, students need to be reverse engineering, and that's something that we're gonna talk about in a minute when I get to the tips, what they want and start laying the pathway for that through activities and service and jobs and course selection.
I'm not saying that a freshman high school, you know, high schooler needs to know what they want to do for the rest of their lives, but a freshman in high school does know that they're going to be applying for college. That's not a surprise, and even the most basic level of planning means that that student needs to be thinking, okay, what do I need to be doing now that will pay off in two to [00:15:00] three years from now?
No, I just alluded to a strategy a minute ago, but one way to improve planning skills is to use the strategy of reverse engineering. I'm gonna give you a sort of overview of what reverse engineering looks like and how to do it, but keep in mind that reverse engineering is a strategy. It's a very how to skill.
Like you could literally go into Google and type in, or even chat GPT, and type in how to reverse engineer this goal, whatever your goal is. Okay. Some people with more developed executive functions almost automatically use reverse engineering to complete something or to map out something that they wanna complete in the future.
But someone without developed executive functions may not even know that this is a tool to use in the first place. So let me go back to my example, to the high school student applying to college. Let's say that she's a freshman and she was well advised that that's when she needed to start planning for college.
Let's say that she, you know, either worked with me or had some idea of [00:16:00] what planning for college looked like, and she had some familiarity. Fa familiarity. I'm just gonna go with that, with reverse engineering. Okay? This is what her journey might look like. She might start thinking, okay, what do I want in college?
What general fields am I interested in? What general fields am I not interested in? Who do I know in my life in a particular field who seems happy and successful, whatever that means, whose career seems interesting to me? Okay. And after some brainstorming, the kid's like, okay, well I don't love the sciences, but I think I wanna do something with business.
Whatever that means. Okay, so during her freshman year, she could probably get some kind of summer, summer job, if that's possible. Yeah. For the money, but also for, you know, the thing that she can put on her application and her resume that indicates that she has some interest in business. Even if she's just scooping ice cream, she may wanna ask an uncle or an aunt if she could, you know, shadow them for a few hours a semester in whatever company that they work for.
This would look terrific on a resume or a college application. [00:17:00] When it comes to course selection, underwater basket weaving might sound really cool, but if it's between that and psychology or that, and some kind of like finance or visiting, uh, visiting, oh my gosh, marketing business course can't talk today, the answer's obvious.
Someone without planning skills might just say, Hey, this like underwater basket weaving course seems really cool and I'm gonna take it. And then come senior year, they realize that underwater basket weaving does not look that great on a college application of someone interested in business. I. You see what I'm saying here?
You start from the end goal, even if it's not super clear what that is in the moment, the general vicinity of some kind of end goal, and then you work backwards from there and you ask yourself what needs to happen for that end goal to be achieved? What needs to happen in the next year, in the next semester, in the next month, in the next week, tomorrow, and today?
And then working from the end, you create a reverse path to where you are now, and then you take a step forward on that plan that you [00:18:00] created. Can you pivot? Yes, but that won't be a big deal because you know how to plan, right? And you actually map this out on paper or in a doc somewhere. If you have a work goal or a, you know, a work project that's due in a month, write that at the top of a Google Doc or a piece of paper and ask yourself what needs to happen right before I reach the goal, and then what needs to happen one step before that, and then one step before that.
Okay, we are moving. I'm spending a lot of time on each of these. I'm gonna try to go a little bit faster. We are moving on to the next executive function skill that has to be in place for some level of personal and professional efficiency in the real world, and that is time management. We talk a lot in the show about time management, so I am going to leave my key time management episodes and resources linked in the show notes that is at Learnandworksmarter.com/podcast/69.
This is episode 69, but essentially time management involves estimating time prioritizing, allocating time. Realistically, [00:19:00] it's the skill of making time visible on a calendar and seeing your time or lack of time for what it really is and not what we imagine it to be. Someone with executive function deficits with or without a DHD often deals with time blindness.
Time blindness is essentially an inability to do what I just listed off, which is estimating time, allocating time, you know, realistically having a general sense of time passing. And that's why someone with executive function deficits needs to be externalizing time. And we're gonna talk about that when I get into the tips for this one.
But if you struggle with time management, you're probably running late a lot. You're missing deadlines. You turn in assignments late. You always feel rushed. You feel like you could never keep up. Like as soon as you submit something or turn something in or do something, there is something else for you to do.
I mean, part of that's just like real life too. But if this happens, like, and it's swamping you, then this is probably what's going on. So let's talk about two strategies for managing time when executive function isn't happening.
The first strategy is [00:20:00] to make time visible using a calendar. You've heard me talk about this many, many, many, many, many, many times. And to try time blocking for a week. I have a whole episode on time blocking, and again, I will leave that episode linked below. But here's what it could look like.
You type take either a paper planner or a digital calendar, does not matter which one, and you map out not only your appointments and your meetings, but when you plan to do your actual work. Like not just report due Friday, but I'm working on the report on Friday from two to three 30, very specific. Okay, this is time blocking.
You are assigning a task to a specific chunk of time in your calendar and you're giving your future self instructions. Hey, this is when we are doing this thing. All right? And if you've never tried this before and it sounds intense, that's fine. I'm not asking you to overhaul your system overnight. I'm asking you to try this for one week. Because here's what happens when people do this for one week, they see their time for [00:21:00] what it really is.
You can literally look at your calendar and say, oh, I don't have as much time as I thought, or, whoa, I actually do have space for this. I just needed to name it and write it out. Time blocking removes the illusion of time and it replaces that vague sort of mental list of, I'll work on it sometime tomorrow with a clear visual roadmap.
And it's when we get that visual clarity that our brain has less to manage, it's less spinning, less mental clutter.
And this is especially helpful for A DHD brains or people with executive function challenges because it creates that external structure when the internal structure is lacking. Again, just try it for one week.
You can go back to winging it after that if it doesn't work. But most people are surprised by how much easier it is to get things done when time is made visible. Now, the second strategy is to use the formula estimated time times 1.5. This is one of my favorite time management strategies to share with people, especially for people who tend to [00:22:00] underestimate how long things will take.
And, spoiler, spoiler, that is. Everybody, here's the formula. However long you think a task is going to take you, you just multiply that by 1.5 when you plan it on your calendar. So if you think that writing a client proposal is gonna take you 60 minutes, you should plan for 90. If you think you're doing your bio homework is gonna take 40 minutes.
Plan for 60. If you think running to the store is gonna take you 20 minutes, you plan for 30. This strategy works because our brains are notoriously optimistic when it comes to time. We forget to factor in transition time, distractions, little interruptions, the time it takes to boot up our computer. The fact that our brain doesn't switch into productivity mode just 'cause we want it to.
So instead of saying like, you know, I wanna knock this out in 30 minutes, you plan for 45, and if it takes you only 30, like that's awesome. You just bought yourself 15 minutes of bonus time. But if it does take you longer, which it will, you're covered. [00:23:00] The 1.5 rule
or the 1.5 x rule, I guess, is one of the simplest ways to reduce that. Always rushing, always behind feeling. It helps us build margin in our day instead of like stuffing it to the brim with things that technically fit, but only if nothing goes wrong, which I don't know about you, but like things go wrong.
I have used this strategy with high school students, college students, graduate students and professionals, and it always opens up their eyes to see how time really works. So if you want to feel a little less behind, start by adjusting how you estimate. Estimate generously, make it visible. That's time management.
Okay. Moving on to strategy number four, or not strategy, uh, executive function that matters in the real world number four, organization.
Organization is a skill and it's the ability to structure our physical and digital environment to support function. It's setting up our spaces, both, you know, physical and digital to support and enhance what it is that we're doing in that [00:24:00] space. Someone with less developed executive function skills might feel like they're drowning in their files. Their email is really overwhelming and chaotic, uh, losing things a lot. Forget what they named something or where they filed it so they can't find it. This is not at all about being messy or not messy.
Most of my adult professional clients, we meet over Zoom 'cause they're all around the country, which is really cool. And part of what we do sometimes is, you know, they're, they're taking their camera like on their computer or their iPad, whatever, and they're showing me their workspace that's like behind them and we're like doing a little tour of their house and we work through implementing an organization system and sometimes we're starting from square one and there truly is no organization system there at all.
And so we're starting from the ground up, but there's also been times where what I see on camera may objectively, I'm using air quotes. If you're not watching this on YouTube, look messy, but when we dig into it, there actually is a fully functioning organization system beneath it that is working really well for that person.[00:25:00]
And in those cases, I do not advise to fix what ain't broke, right? If you're messy but it works for you, then keep doing what you're doing. I'm not here to tell you what qualifies as messy. My job is to talk about organization and function. Okay? But someone with executive dysfunction, you know, with or without a DHD, may or may not be messy, but they may not have a fully operating and reliable way to organize their things, their personal things, their work things, their school things, and information things.
That's really key here too. Just all the things. Or I see this too. Someone with the best intentions will have an overly complicated organizational system, maybe through some, you know, complicated email inbox rules or filing or folders. And because it is so complicated, there is too much resistance and therefore it doesn't become operational or reliable, and in other words, it, it just doesn't work. I have an episode called Three Most Important Areas to Organize.
That's episode nine. In that episode, I dive really deep into strategies from managing what I [00:26:00] argue are the three most important areas to build organization systems around. That is your digital space, your tasks, and your time. You could throw in physical space too, and I have strategies in that episode for your physical space.
Now, of course, that is not the only episode where I cover organization. I'm gonna share a few more that I will obviously link below, but it's episode 28, 6 Tips for Organizing Papers, episode 41 and 42. This is kind of a fun one. It's a two part series where I share 100 organization tips for school and work, and then episode 59.
Is seven. I think it's seven. Six or seven. A DH. D tips. A DHD organization. A DHD Organization. Tips for Students and Professionals. So check out those episodes if you've identified as being someone who needs more organizational support. All the tips I could possibly share are in those episodes. Okay.
The fifth executive function, yeah, this episode's gonna be a little bit longer than usual, critical to personal, professional, academic success is working memory. [00:27:00] Working memory is the ability to hold information in your head long enough to use it. Now we are talking about the brain for a second. Okay. And, and there are different parts of the brain that are connected to memory.
The primary ones are the hippocampus, the amygdala, the cerebellum, and that prefrontal cortex That is the star of today's episode and of the executive function show. So someone with ADHD or executive dysfunction has very real differences in brain structure and neurochemicals related to working memory.
So I'm gonna talk about this a little bit more when I get to the tip section, okay? But you are not going to ever hear me share tips to improve your memory, but rather to support it because that is not at all what executive function support looks like for someone who's neurodivergent.
Okay? If you're not neurodivergent and you just haven't built up your working memory or learned strategies for remembering these things than a different set of strategies will be for you. Okay? I share some memorization strategies in my blog on school [00:28:00] habits.com. You can always go there. But the tips I share for this episode are about supporting your working memory.
Not like remembering harder. 'cause that's just, that's not a thing, right? What does a working memory deficit look like in the real world? It's being told something and forgetting it nearly immediately. It's sitting in a lecture class and realizing that you don't remember the last five minutes of the lecture.
It's struggling to do mental math 'cause it's a challenge to hold numbers in your head as you calculate them. It can be difficulty with reading comprehension because you read something and what you read earlier on in that page or a few pages ago is, is gone. I'm gonna share some tips for supporting working memory, but before I do that again, please hear me.
If for some reason you've zoned out right now while listening to this episode, I want you to zone back in. ADHD or not, executive dysfunction or not, we need to move away from this idea that we're meant to remember everything that is not true, and that's not helpful in this super overstimulating, fast-paced [00:29:00] world that we live in.
Technology and society and information structures have evolved exponentially faster than the sweet little tissues and neurons in our brain. So it's like our brains are in one era, but the things that we're expecting our brains to do are in a futuristic era. And we have to accept this and start supporting ourselves for the brains that we have now, not for the brains that we wish we had.
It is foolish to think that we can remember all of our assignments and when they're due and the details of them. It is foolish to think that we can remember all of our passwords. It is foolish to think that we can store all of our work tasks in our brain. That is not what our brains are designed for.
Our brains are designed for thinking and creating and spontaneous thoughts and forming connections. Not for storing random nuggets of information like when your essay is due. So again, a DHD or not, executive dysfunction, or not neurodivergent or not, we need to be relying on external structures to carry the [00:30:00] weight of so much of what we are foolishly expecting our brains to do.
So what does that look like? It looks like having a task management system. It looks like storing your passwords and login credentials somewhere reasonable. It's setting reminders on your phone. It's writing sticky notes and putting 'em on your computer screen. It's using a project manager and an assignment notebook.
And a calendar. Yeah, those are strategies for everybody. If you're someone with a DHD and executive dysfunction, it is supporting yourself in additional ways such as graphic organizers for essays, so you remember what you're supposed to put where. It's obviously using calculators and not expecting yourself to do mental math.
It's advocating for yourself and asking for people and teachers to give you directions that are only three steps or less. And if you can't make that possible and you're given 10 step directions, it's on you to say, I need to write this down, or, well, I need to take up my phone and record this. That's on you.
So again, the strategy isn't to say, come on, brain, like remember harder. No way. The strategy is to say, well, my [00:31:00] brain is gonna brain and so I need to show up with my tools.
That's the magic right there. Having the self-awareness enough to call a duck. A duck. The self-advocacy to say, this is what I need to do to support who I am, and then the willingness to commit to those systems when the inner voice says, yeah, but I'll just remember it. No, you won't.
Okay. So we just went through five executive functions that are very tactile and strategy based, and I would say for the most part, generally easy to understand.
We're gonna shift things a little bit. The next five executive functions may be a little more abstract. They're not as utilitarian as make a calendar and like write a to-do, to-do list, right? So bear with me if some of them are new to you. I'm sure that as I explained them, you'll say, oh, like I know what that is.
I just didn't know there was a name for it. And we are gonna start with cognitive flexibility.
So this is an executive function that if it's not there can lead to stress and personal disappointment and trouble, you know, maintaining a job and reaching goals and even forming relationships.
Cognitive flexibility is the ability to shift your thinking and adapt when [00:32:00] certain circumstances change. It's the skill that helps us pivot when plans get disrupted or the way we thought something was gonna happen or gonna go doesn't go that way. It's what allows us to try a new approach if the first one isn't working.
It's what helps us shift perspectives in a conversation when you realize that someone else might be right, it's what helps you go with the flow when the flow gets wild. Now, someone who struggles with cognitive flexibility might fall apart emotionally or logistically when their routine gets thrown off.
They might be a black and white thinker who believes there's just one right way to do something, and if it doesn't work, then there's just a total shutdown. Or they get stuck in ineffective problem solving loops, trying the same thing over and over again, even though it's clearly not working. You might recognize yourself in this.
If you've ever had a meltdown when your wifi went out or didn't, something didn't go as planned. Or if you've said, well, I can't possibly get this done and unless I have exactly three hours of uninterrupted quiet time, and then didn't do anything when that [00:33:00] scenario didn't happen. Or maybe you've been in a situation where a meeting got rescheduled or a tool wasn't working, or someone on your team didn't show up, and instead of regrouping you froze, you spiraled.
You just mentally quit. That's a lack of cognitive flexibility. But here's the thing. Flexibility is not the same as flakiness. This isn't about being loosey goosey with your plans or giving up structure altogether. It's about knowing how to pivot within structure when you need to. All right, so what are some ways to support cognitive flexibility?
One strategy I love is to ask yourself better questions in the moment of stuckness. Try what else could work? What would this look like if it were easy? I love that question. Um, or what would this look like if it were simple? If I couldn't do it this way as planned, how else could I get to the same result?
These questions are like little gentle nudges. They open up new pathways in our thinking instead of letting us just get stuck in this one track mode. Now another [00:34:00] strategy is to practice cognitive flexibility in low stake situations.
So what the, when the stakes are higher, your brain already has some experience adapting. You can deliberately switch up your routine, like taking a new route to work or trying a new grocery store even when you don't have to. You're building your, I'll call it pivot muscle before you need it for real.
The goal here isn't perfection. It's training your brain to see that there's often more than one way to move forward. And when the first path disappears, we don't need to shut down. You just look for another path. There's always another path.
All right, next up. Number seven, inhibition or impulse control.
So inhibition, which is also known as impulse control, is the executive function skill that helps us resist distractions. Pause before reacting. Think before reacting. I love how Dr. Ned Hallowell describes it. Um, he's like the A DHD guru. I have his book behind me. I was also on his podcast, which is [00:35:00] so cool years ago.
Anyways, what he says, it's having a DHD is like having a Ferrari engine with bicycle breaks. You're fast, you're powerful, you're full of ideas, but your braking system, your impulse control isn't strong enough to slow you down when you need to. That's what inhibition is, your internal braking system. Now, in real life when someone lacks inhibition, it might look like blurting something out in a meeting before you know you thoroughly thought it through, or even before someone else is done talking. It might look like doom scrolling on your phone when you know you're supposed to be finishing a project
that's due in 45 minutes. It might look like interrupting someone over and over again during a conversation, not because you're trying to be rude, but because the urge to speak your thoughts before you forget it feels so strong that it just overrides everything else. And to be clear, impulse control issues are not always loud or visible.
Sometimes they show up as mental impulsivity. So jumping from thought to thought, jumping from project to project, [00:36:00] starting something without finishing it or making fast decisions without considering the consequences. For example, someone might impulsively say yes to a work task or a new client project without actually thinking about whether they have time to do it.
They realize only later that they've overly committed.
All right, so what can you do if you struggle with inhibition. One strategy is to use what I call the ten second pause. It's exactly what it sounds like when you feel that urge to act, whether it's clicking a tab, replying to a message, jumping into a conversation, you just pause for 10 seconds.
Yes, I'm gonna recommend that all of us just pause all of the time. I'm learning about how powerful the pause is. Okay. 10 seconds is long enough to let your brain catch up to the impulse. It gives you just enough space to decide whether you actually wanna do the thing or whether you're just reacting out of habit or urgency.
Now another strategy is to build an intentional friction between you and the impulse. If you tend to check your phone every three minutes, put it in another room while you're working. If you know you impulse buy [00:37:00] things you know online, remove your credit card from autofill. You're making the impulse action just slightly harder, and that's often enough to help you regain control in the moment.
It is not about eliminating impulses altogether. That's really hard to do. That's like saying focus more. No, we don't do that. We just support our focus in other ways. It's not about eliminating the impulse, which can sometimes be primal and we're not. I'm, I don't know how to change our primal instincts. I don't know if anybody does, but it's about creating the space between the urge and the action.
That's where our power lives.
Okay. Executive function skill number eight that matters in the real world is emotional regulation. Emotional regulation is the executive function skill that helps us manage our emotions so that they don't hijack our behaviors, our decisions, and our general ability to function.
This is not at all about suppressing emotions. It's not about faking calm or pretending we're not upset. Emotional regulation is about feeling what you feel,
but [00:38:00] keeping those feelings from completely derailing your day, your relationships, or your work.
When emotional regulation is weak, a person might get completely thrown off by a single piece of criticism, or they might snap at a coworker over something small and then carry shame or guilt about that for the rest of the day.
You might notice yourself saying things like, well, I was having a great day until like that one thing happened, or I can't think, stop thinking about how that one person spoke to me, or I lost it on my partner over something tiny and I don't even know why. I always know why. That's what it can look like when emotions become dysregulated because the executive functions aren't in place. In a professional setting.
This can show up as overreacting to an unexpected change. Maybe internalizing feedback in a destructive way. Oh, I have a podcast on how to accept feedback. I'll actually forgot about that one. I'm gonna, I'll link that one. Or maybe shutting down 'cause the meeting didn't go the way that, you know, we hoped. For students, it's really the same thing. Here's [00:39:00] something important to note. People who struggle with emotional regulation often, often know that they're being reactive, but they feel powerless in the moment to do anything about it. And that's because emotional regulation isn't a mindset, it's a skill and it can be learned.
So how do we support the skill?
Well, one strategy. Pause and name it. Yeah, we're doing the pause again. It sounds simple, but it's incredibly effective. When you notice yourself having a big emotion, frustration, shame, fear, rage, you literally name it out loud or in your head you say, this is anger, this is disappointment, this is shame.
Now, if you're hearing that right now and you're thinking it's cheesy, let me explain why it works. The act of naming the emotion moves the experience from the amygdala, which is our emotional brain to the prefrontal cortex, which is your thinking brain. It interrupts that emotional spiral just long enough to give you more control over your next step.
You're not suppressing, your grounding. You know, I've been working really hard and actively to teach this [00:40:00] skill to my kids, they're, you know, early teenagers. And to do that, we're using the actual words, emotional regulation. They might think I'm so annoying doing this, but one day I think they're gonna thank me.
We're now using the shared language. When someone can say, I'm dysregulated when things start to escalate and we all know what to do in that moment. Is it always successful and perfect. It is not, but I'm sticking with it and they're doing an awesome job with it. Because if I can raise emotionally regulated adults like, yes, please, yes, please.
And you're welcome world. The shared language can be so powerful in families, in teams, in classrooms. It gives everyone a name for what's going on, for something that is so human, and it also gives permission to pause. Emotional regulation does not mean bottling things up. It means creating space between the emotion and the action so that we can respond with intention instead of react.
I know I'm going deep here, but these things are so important. We have two left. Number nine, [00:41:00] goal directed persistence. Alright. How are we doing for time? This is a long episode. This might be my record. Goal directed persistence is the executive function skill that allows us to stick with a goal over time, even when motivation dips or distractions arise or progress feels slow.
It is similar to task endurance. I've already mentioned that a little bit, but here's the difference.
Task endurance is short term. It's the ability to stay focused while writing an essay for 60 minutes or pushing through to finish a report before lunch. But goal-directed persistence is long-term. It's staying connected to a goal that we care about for weeks, for months, maybe even years, when the payoff is not immediate.
This is the skill that helps people finish degrees, build businesses, stay consistent with savings plans, complete passion projects, or train for something. It's the skill of long game follow through. Without it, what tends to happen is this: people start projects full of excitement and energy [00:42:00] and they're super motivated at first and they make quick progress and they love that instant gratification.
But the moment they hit a snag or the initial excitement wears off, they stall out. They get distracted by something shiny. They move on to the next idea or they give up altogether 'cause it stopped feeling good. If you've ever abandoned a New Year's resolution by February, if you've ever started a creative project and never touched it again, if you've ever said, I don't think this is working anymore after just a temporary setback, then you know exactly what a lack of goal-directed persistence looks like.
So how do we support this skill? One strategy I recommend is using visual progress tracking. Now our brains are terrible at perceiving long-term progress. If we don't see it, we assume it's not happening, so we need to make it visible.
This could mean using a simple habit tracker, a wall calendar, a color coded spreadsheet. There's awesome habit tracking apps. Something like Don't Break the chain, I remember was one that I used a long time ago. Obviously, there's apps for everything [00:43:00] and they change every day, but search for it. The key is that if you see evidence that you're moving forward, even if it's slowly, you're more likely to keep going.
Another strategy is accountability. Tell someone your goal. Ideally tell someone who also has this goal and is willing to check in with you regularly to share progress. This kind of social accountability can be helpful, especially when the internal motivation dips because when we share our goals, they start to exist outside of us and that can add just enough pressure to keep us engaged when we
would otherwise wanna quit. I'm like outta breath and thirsty. Okay. I don't even have water. Oh, well we're gonna, we're gonna rally folks.One more. Almost there. Number 10, self-monitoring. Self-monitoring is the executive function skill that helps us check in with ourselves as we're doing something and after we've done it. In the EF executive function world, this skill is called metacognition, which is just a fancy word for thinking about thinking.
It's the internal voice that asks, am I doing this the way I [00:44:00] intended? Is this working? How did that go? What am I even doing? This voice matters, because self-monitoring helps us adjust in real time. It helps us learn from past experiences and lets us improve our performance moving forward.
Without self-monitoring, we move through tasks and conversations on autopilot. We don't stop to assess if we are being effective, if we are misunderstanding something or if we need to shift our approach. We just go through the motions. In the real world, a lack of self-monitoring might look like studying for hours just by rereading your notes without realizing that
you're not actually learning anything because rereading is not studying. Reading a chapter of a book and getting to the end of a page only to realize that you have absolutely no idea what you just read. Nodding in a conversation, but secretly zoning out and not even noticing that you've zoned out until someone asks you a question.
Making the same mistake multiple times in your job, but never stepping [00:45:00] back to figure out like what is going wrong? What do I not know? People who lack self-monitoring often feel stuck. They'll say like, I'm working so hard, but nothing's changing because they aren't pausing. Pausing, there's the pause to analyze why their efforts aren't translating into results.
So how can you strengthen this skill? Well, one of the simplest strategies is to build in mini check-ins, both during and after a task. You can do this verbally, mentally, or even in writing, and you ask yourself, what helped me succeed right now? What got in my way? What would I do differently next time? Do I even know what I'm doing right now?And why does this feel hard? If you're working on a project, pause halfway and say, am I still on track? If you just finished a difficult conversation, take two minutes and ask yourself like, did I communicate clearly? Or What worked in that interaction? What didn't work? The truth is that people who learn to self-monitor don't have fewer challenges at all.
They just catch them earlier and they adjust faster. That's the superpower. Not avoiding [00:46:00] challenges and hard things, but knowing what went wrong so you can fix the thing sooner.
Oh my God, my mouth is so dry, but we made it. Let's wrap up those 10 executive function skills we covered today so you can hear them one more time.Task initiation, planning, time management, organization, working memory, cognitive flexibility inhibition, which is sometimes called impulse control, emotional regulation, goal directed persistence, which is similar to task endurance, and self-monitoring. Now, let me leave you with this thought. Don't, don't, don't leave me.
You've been with me this far. Don't leave me yet. So many people beat themselves up for being lazy or unmotivated when really they've just never been taught the skills that make everything possible. And the good news that these skills are learnable, they're buildable. They do not require perfection. They don't require some magical moment of transformation.
And even working on just one of these skills can make everything in your day, in your week, in your month, in your life more manageable. Your goals more [00:47:00] doable, and your system's more sustainable. If you wanna dive deeper into executive functioning support, I have a bunch of resources for you.
Check out my blog schoolhabits.com where I've written hundreds of posts on executive function topics like time management, task management, all the things. Check out the resources on LearnandWorksmarter.com/podcast/69. That's everything I mentioned today. And if you are really ready to build these skills in a structured way, my course SchoolHabits University walks you through exactly how to do that step by step.
If you found this episode helpful, please share it with someone who might need it too. And don't forget to subscribe so you don't make this next week's episode in everything coming down the pipeline. Thank you for your time today and never stop learning.
