New year’s resolutions to make you think more like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg
As if running a $221bn (£142bn) company isn't enough, Mark Zuckerberg is known for his commitment to keeping new year's resolutions.
Every year, the Facebook founder sets himself a new challenge – a process which, he told an audience last week, forces him to "do other things outside of [work]".
But Zuckerberg doesn't just go for ordinary resolutions – a quick look at his past commitments provides a hint of the single-minded determination it took him to build his business up to the leviathan it is today.
So if you want to think more like Zuckerberg, ditch vague intentions like "get fit" or "lose weight". Be more specific – and don't be afraid to mix professional resolutions with personal goals:
Mark's resolution list
- 2009 – Wear a tie to work every day
- 2010 – Learn Mandarin (he proved his success in October when he participated in a 30-minute Q&A session with students at Tsinghua University, entirely in Mandarin)
- 2011 – Go veggie (with the exception of meat he's butchered himself)
- 2012 – Get back to basics and do more coding
- 2013 – Meet someone new who doesn't work at Facebook every day
- 2014 – Write a thank you note to someone who has changed the world every day (a goal he described as "surprisingly difficult")
This year, Zuckerberg is "crowdsourcing" his target. In a Facebook post last night, he said he would "love ideas from our community".
Suggestions so far include only eating dinners made by him, running a mile every day – and, er, closing down Facebook for a day each year "with the aim of encouraging people to talk to a new person in real life".
Unfortunately, Zuckerberg also added that "I have an idea of what my next challenge might be" – so those suggestions might end up being in vain…