The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

Duhigg opens with the story of the Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA), which is a major metal corporation. For decades, its employees worked in dangerous conditions that led to high rates of employee injury and death. In 1987, Paul O’Neill became ALCOA’s new CEO. His first task as CEO was to drastically improve worker safety—correcting what was, in effect, a bad habit within the company. In O’Neill’s case, he kept the cue the same (when an employee was injured) but changed the routine and reward. Once someone was injured, O’Neill required staff to swiftly report the injury and implement a new plan for worker safety. As a reward, the staff who followed the safety routine rose in the company’s ranks. The new CEO understood that he would have more success by “attacking one habit and then watching the changes ripple through the organization” (100).

Duhigg introduces the term “keystone habit”: “The habits that matter most,” he writes, “are the ones that, when they start to shift, dislodge and remake other patterns” (101). In the case of ALCOA, O’Neill’s change to worker safety was a keystone habit. Once that improved, so did other organizational habits: productivity, worker satisfaction, and profits. Duhigg argues that leaders seeking to change the habits of their organizations should first achieve small wins. Do not expect to overhaul the entire system in one go.

Duhigg points to other case studies to highlight keystone habits. Bob Bowman, for example, coached Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps, who followed a strict habit routine before every race: “All [Bowman] needed to do was target a few specific habits that had nothing to do with swimming and everything to do with creating the right mind-set” (111). Once Phelps learned his race-day routine, which started when he woke up, his body began to automatically move through the day and the race.