Becker Private Equity & Business Podcast
Becker Private Equity & Business Podcast

The Dumbest Things I Do: Part Two 2-28-26

2 min
•Feb 28, 2026about 2 months ago
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Summary

Scott Becker discusses the second installment of his "Dumbest Things I Do" series, focusing on his counterintuitive habit of adding completed tasks to his to-do list just to cross them off for psychological satisfaction. The episode also briefly mentions recent private equity fund performance issues and Circle Internet's market surge.

Insights
  • Task-oriented professionals may engage in self-aware but irrational behaviors to maintain psychological momentum and sense of accomplishment
  • The satisfaction of completing tasks can be more important than the actual completion itself, revealing insights into motivation psychology
  • Personal productivity habits, even inefficient ones, can be deeply ingrained and difficult to change despite awareness of their illogic
  • Audience engagement and content format preferences vary significantly, requiring direct feedback to optimize podcast strategy
Trends
Growing interest in personal productivity psychology and behavioral economics in business podcastingPrivate equity fund underperformance as an emerging concern in investment marketsCryptocurrency volatility and sudden market movements (Circle Internet surge)Shift toward more personal, relatable content in B2B business podcasts beyond purely transactional advice
Companies
Circle Internet
Cryptocurrency or fintech company that experienced a 30% market surge on Wednesday, mentioned as recent business news.
People
Scott Becker
Host of the Becker Business and Private Equity Podcast; discusses his personal productivity quirks and business insig...
Quotes
"Sometimes I finish a task and I forgot to put it on my to-do list. And of course if you finish a task and you didn't put it on your to-do list there's this great question as to whether you really did the task or not."
Scott Becker
"I feel good when I write something off the list. When I knock it off the list, I feel like, okay, I've made progress today."
Scott Becker
"Sometimes I've completed a task that I forgot to put on the to-do list, and then I'll go ahead and put that task on the to-do list, even though it's already done, just so I could cross it out to give me the satisfaction of crossing that off the list."
Scott Becker
Full Transcript
This is Scott Becker with the Becker Business and the Becker Private Equity Podcast. We generally throughout the week give you short episodes around business topics. We covered this week the private equity funds and how poorly they're performing, Circle Internet, how it surged on Wednesday by something like 30 percent, and a number of other podcasts around real business issues. Then I often try and talk about some of the dumb things that I do, and this will be Saturday's podcast. So we're going to discuss here the dumbest things that I do, part two. We talked about in the last podcast how sometimes I'll find myself arguing with a bot on Twitter and often can't help myself even we'll go another round with the bot once I realize that's a bot. So that's one phase of stupidity. That was an earlier podcast we did, the dumbest things that we do, part one. Today's discussion is the dumbest thing that we do, part two. So usually every day I put together a list of here's what I got to do today. And I'm one of these people who's quite task oriented. I feel good when I write something off the list. When I knock it off the list, I feel like, okay, I've made progress today. So here the dumb thing that I do Sometimes I finish a task and I forgot to put it on my to list And of course if you finish a task and you didn put it on your to list there's this great question as to whether you really did the task or not. And so sometimes I've completed a task that I forgot to put on the to-do list, and then I'll go ahead and put that task on the to-do list, even though it's already done, just so I could cross it out to give me the satisfaction of crossing that off the list. And so that is, for me, today's discussion, the dumbest thing that I do part two. I'll know if people hate this or love this episode where I talk about some of the stupider stuff, the dumber things that I do. I'll know by how we end up in the rankings the day or two after this from a business news perspective. But I'd also love, If anybody wants, text me at 773-766-5322. And just let me know if you love or hate this episode and whether we just stick to just core business, straight business, or you enjoy these kinds of episodes too. We'd really appreciate it. Thank you for listening to the Becker Business and the Becker Private Equity Podcast. Have a great weekend and a great next week. Thank you so much.