Business Is A Performance Sport - Grab A Donut

Find out why donuts are good for the executive and the entrepreneur.



Why You Should Have A Donut Before Your Next Important Meeting

I can't imagine anyone who does not like a donut or two.  But almost all of us of responsible,.. shall I say disposition, also try and avoid the confounding cousin of this devil food as some would say.

Now I am going to tell you something that is going to make you happy today. I will give you an irrefutable, incontrovertible reason to grab a donut and feel awesome about it.

Did you know that solid experimental research has abundantly, clearly established that your performance as a negotiator improves substantially beyond any doubt if you consume sugar just before the meeting.  In fact, during intensely cognitive tasks  or decision making your brain really needs that fuel to function well.... I mean statistically significant and practically meaningful with a massive effect size (being a statistician I like to throw the big words).

What you may not realize is the magnitude of the difference in performance on decision making tasks that sugar right before can make.

Recent research has discovered that when you have low blood sugar levels it changes the way you make decisions. You may rely more on intuition than reasoning. And why is that? Because reasoning is real hard work and consumes a lot of energy in the form of the blood glucose stored in our brain. Now a days we are bombarded with information right from the time we wake up and have to make sense of things pretty much throughout the day - the sugar levels in our brain can deplete pretty fast leaving us mentally below our best.

In the study, it was found that participants who had something sugary before a decision making test performed better compared to those who had something with a sugar substitute, like diet coke. And we are not talking about simple day to day matters, blood sugar levels can even affect critical decision making as found in yet another study where it was observed that parole judges who spent entire days reviewing applications for parole tended to give their approval more right after they had food, and would take the safe path of denying when they were nearest to their meal time that is when they were significantly depleted.

SO for your next important meeting do not forget to pick up the donut  and also feel good about it.