Nir Eyal writes, consults, and teaches about the intersection of psychology, technology, and business. Nir previously taught as a Lecturer in Marketing at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford. 

Nir co-founded and sold two tech companies since 2003 and was dubbed by The M.I.T. Technology Reviewas, “The Prophet of Habit-Forming Technology.” Bloomberg Businessweek wrote, “Nir Eyal is the habits guy. Want to understand how to get app users to come back again and again? Then Eyal is your man.”

He is the author of two bestselling books, Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products and Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life.

What we covered in this episode:

• What motivated Nir to write Indistractable
• The one topic that hadn’t been written about
• Focusing on what works in practice and not just in theory
• How the book helped work, life, family and health
• Why we get in our own way
• What it’s like to see your own book on the shelf
• Who Nir really wrote the book
• Why yellow is the best colour for a book and podcast
• Understanding what causes distraction
• The role of intent in separating traction and distraction
• Why you shouldn’t write a to-do list
• Focus on what is important rather than easy
• How work tasks can also be distraction
• The internal and external triggers of distraction
• The shocking 90% of distractions that come from within us
• How we have to master our internal triggers
• The secret hack of planning our time rather than to-do’s
• The myth of will power of a depleting resource and the one group for whom its true
• Why you should avoid seeing yourself as a victim
• Changing the narrative we tell about ourselves
• Living to your own values rather than other peoples
• Making time for traction by turning values into time
• Being generous with your money and stingy with your time
• The importance of planning time for fun and interacting with people
• Dividing work into reflective vs reactive work
• Using your calender rather than email to determine your day
• The tyranny of the to-do list
• How to a get to a higher level of team productivity
• Using communication tools like a hot-tub
• How to manage your boss
• The role of culture in supporting its people to be Indistractable
• How BCG changed their business culture
• Work hard and go home – the lesson from Slack
• Why focus is the superpower of the century
• How to approach meetings
• Why 80% of meetings have no agenda
• The surprising number for the optimum number of people in a brainstorm
• The only reason to have a meeting
• The homework required before every meeting