Habit stacking, Momentum, success, routine, impact purpose CEO of Momentum Group, Jeanette Marais, Image: Supplied
Through mindful rituals, strong leadership, and a relentless pursuit of excellence, Jeanette demonstrates how small, consistent actions can lead to lasting impact.
It’s a new year! What are some of the habits or routines you start the year off with that set the tone for the success of that year?
I make sure that I rest enough. Given that my job is in Centurion and my husband lives in Paternoster, I have a home in Centurion where I live during the week, but I travel to our farm in Paternoster every weekend. Because time with my husband is so precious, I make sure that I don’t work while I’m there. I don’t switch on my laptop during weekends. I truly rest and spend quality time with my husband. That enables me to work long hours and non-stop during the week, with a rested mind and body.
I also stick to my exercise routine. I run, box and exercise on my rebounder. My daily exercise energises me and gets rid of all the adrenaline I tend to build up during the day.
I make it a repetitive ritual to spend time with my friends and loved ones. I’m very close to my siblings and their families and I have a wonderful, small circle of girlfriends. I make sure to spend quality time, but also enough time with them. When we’re together, I’m not on my phone, I’m in the moment, fully present.
My husband and I call each other every night at 10pm. Whether I’m in Gauteng or in India or the USA, I call him 10pm SA time to really connect with him at least once a day.
Do you practice habit-stacking? Are there any habits that you pair with daily routines to make sure you stick to them? For instance – listen to a podcast while running for example.
I exercise with people I want to socialise with. In Houtbay I have a wonderful circle of running friends – we’ve been running buddies for 30 years! And in Gauteng I have a good friend who’s my boxing partner, and my niece and I run together. In that way, I enjoy the exercise more, but I also stay in touch with my friends.
I also try to make my rituals as pleasant as possible: I don’t just take a bath, I light candles and have a glass of wine. I don’t just go to sleep, my bedroom is a sanctuary where I don’t take my laptop or my phone – it’s a wonderful room with light-blocking curtains and top quality bedding. Because I don’t get a lot of sleep, I really need to make my sleep hours worthwhile.
I spend a lot of time travelling and I get my best work done on an aeroplane – no-one can interrupt me and it becomes my best time to really focus. I carefully plan ahead what I want to get done in the precious two hours on a flight, and I make sure that time counts.
Because I spend a lot of time driving between Cape Town and Paternoster, I also listen to audio books while I drive.
What are some of the key habits you practice, ensuring you have a productive day, that have made a significant difference on your journey to success over time?
The most important habit is to discern between what is truly priority and what is not. People tend to push their priorities onto you, but you need to know what you need to spend your energy on.
It’s also critical to understand the difference between what’s important and what’s urgent. Hundreds of urgent tasks come my way every day, but I need to give my best time and attention to what’s important. It also helps to have a good team who can take care of some of the urgent items, screaming for attention, on my behalf.
In general, I prepare well in advance. I know myself: I’m at my best when I can walk in with confidence and be in a conversation with the right information at hand. I hate being unprepared or ill-informed.
Every year, in the first week before work starts, I see my financial adviser to check that my financial journey is still on track to success, I review my will, I go for all my annual health check-ups, and I have my eye test and get glasses if needed. Having all the personal admin out the way enables me to focus on work the rest of the year.
Your business is very big on client service – what are some of the habits you think are critical to take customer service from good to great in 2025?
Get into the habit of being human. At Momentum we are human beings dealing with other human beings who are often going through the most difficult time in their lives when they contact us; when a loved one had passed away, when they just heard that they have cancer, or when they were in a car accident. I always tell our employees to treat every client as if it’s your mom or your best friend. Just imagine your favourite person on earth and treat the client as you would’ve treated someone you love.
What are some leadership habits that you have cultivated that you believe are critical for the success of your team or organisation?
I am continuously in relentless pursuit of excellence. Good is simply not good enough for me, and mediocrity is not an option. I’ve been told that I’m fundamentally unreasonable about standards and details. I find that people say that to shut you down. But I want to start a new conversation, because no-one who ever changed the world did so by being reasonable! You need to be unreasonable to see a world that doesn’t yet exist.
I’ve also learnt that, when chasing excellence, you never ‘arrive’. It's a never-ending journey of improvement. I constantly raise the bar. Every task, no matter how small gets my full attention. Every single action matters. The way you do one thing is the way you do everything. It’s not just big things like chasing financial targets, it’s how you write an email, how you connect with a person at the coffee stand. Every little thing counts. Remember, raindrops make oceans.
As a leader – how do you instil good habits in your leadership team and employees to get the best out of them?
I don’t think you can really instil good habits in others, but I think you can inspire people by how you live it yourself, how you show up. People watch what you do, more than they listen to what you say. For example, because I’m always 100% prepared, I find that people are not unprepared when they come to me.
I have instilled rituals in our executive meetings - we are radically transparent with each other, there are no holy cows or unsaid things left on the table. We have contracted with each other the freedom to speak your mind, and there will be no offence taken. This is the foundation of a healthy culture.
Culture can determine the success of an organisation – what are some of the crucial things you think need to be done to ensure that employees and leaders have the right mindset to form the right habits?
Behaviour is critical, even more so than mindset. Often you don’t think yourself into a new way of acting, you act yourself into a new way of thinking. People wait to ‘feel different’ before they take action. It actually works the other way round: you first need to take action, then you start feeling different.
Think of exercise – it is not a habit immediately. You don’t wake up one day and love running and is an athlete. You start with new behaviours – you start running short distances regularly. You get up early in the morning. Then it becomes a habit and you feel weird if you don’t run. And then you start loving it, and next thing, you ARE a runner. And then you start performing better and you are rewarded by the results of your perseverance. And that feeds your mindset and before you know, you are not only enjoying that marathon, but you also change other habits such as eating healthier! It’s a virtuous cycle.
Habit stacking is about small, consistent steps in the right direction. What role does purpose play in making sure that a person stays committed to the most effective habits?
Purpose moves you forward. If you know it’s worthwhile, you won’t stop. At times when there isn’t progress and you feel stuck, purpose is what will get you unstuck.
I believe that being plugged into something bigger than just yourself, inspires a person to go further and dig deeper than they ever thought possible.
Mine is to make a purposeful impact. Everything you do has an impact, and I want mine to be positive in every little thing I do. And that’s what I measure myself against.