Tony Schwartz asks in a recent post The Magic of Doing One Thing at a Time at Harvard Business Review, why is it that between 25 and 50 percent of people report feeling overwhelmed or burned out at work? The author suggests that it’s not just the number of hours we’re working. He says we spend too many continuous hours juggling too many things at the same time.
In the article he argues that we’ve lost stopping points, finish lines and boundaries. Mr. Schwartz believes that technology has blurred them beyond recognition. Wherever we go, our work follows us, on our digital devices, ever insistent and intrusive. It’s like an itch we can’t resist scratching, even though scratching invariably makes it worse.
Not Helping
Mr. Schwartz points out that “time savers” don’t save time. He argues that answering emails during conference calls; eating lunch at your desk or make calling or sending texts while driving are not helping you be more productive.
The biggest cost, assuming you don’t crash, is to your productivity. You productivity crashes because you are splitting your attention. You are partly engaged in multiple activities but rarely fully engaged in any one. The author explains this impacts your productivity when you switch away from a primary task to do something else. By switching between tasks you’re increasing the time it takes to finish that task by 25%.
The HBR article warns that if you’re always doing something, you’re relentlessly burning down your available reservoir of energy over the course of every day, so you have less available with every passing hour.
Increase focus at work
Mr. Schwartz suggests three policies for managers to increase focus:
1. Maintain meeting discipline. Schedule meetings for 45 minutes, and not an hour or longer, so participants can stay focused, take time afterward to reflect on what’s been discussed, and recover before the next obligation. Start all meetings at a precise time, end at a precise time, and insist that all digital devices be turned off throughout the meeting.
2. Stop demanding or expecting instant responsiveness at every moment of the day. It forces your people into reactive mode, fractures their attention, and makes it difficult for them to sustain attention on their priorities. Let them turn off their email at certain times. If it’s urgent, you can call them — but that won’t happen very often.
3. Encourage renewal. Create at least one time during the day when you urge your people to stop working and take a break. Offer a mid afternoon class in yoga, or meditation, organize a group walk or workout, or consider creating a renewal room where people can relax, or take a nap.
Steps to take
The blog says that people have to set their own boundaries:
1. Do the most important thing first in the morning, preferably without interruption, for 60 to 90 minutes, with a clear start and stop time. If possible, work in a private space during this period, or with sound-reducing earphones. Finally, resist every impulse to distraction, knowing that you have a designated stopping point. The more absorbed you can get, the more productive you’ll be. When you’re done, take at least a few minutes to renew.
2. Establish regular, scheduled times to think more long-term, creatively, or strategically. If you don’t, you’ll constantly succumb to the tyranny of the urgent. Also, find a different environment to do this activity — preferably one that’s relaxed and conducive to open-ended thinking.
3. Take real and regular vacations. Real means that when you’re off, you’re truly disconnecting from work. Regular means several times a year if possible, even if some are only two or three days added to a weekend. The research strongly suggests that you’ll be far healthier if you take all of your vacation time, and more productive overall.
A single principle lies at the heart of all these suggestions. The author concludes that when you’re engaged at work, fully engage, for defined periods of time. When you’re renewing, truly renew. Stop living your life in the gray zone.
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My personal experience reinforces the authors conclusions. My experience has been that I was able to get 2x the work done on a single telecommute day, than when I am at the office. Now that I have to be on-site everyday, my work output has decreased because I can’t work without interruption for any period of time.
I have found that you can’t focus on anything when you’re moving 90 mph and you can’t stop to take a breath. Maybe someday I will get an office and see the magic of doing one thing at a time.
Related articles
- 3 Tips for You and Your Employees that will help increase Productivity (corphippie.wordpress.com)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him at LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Mr. Bregman proposes that every day, before leaving the office, save a few minutes to think about what just happened. Look at your calendar and compare what actually happened, the meetings you attended, the work you got done, the conversations you had, the people with whom you interacted, even the breaks you took, with your plan for what you wanted to have happened. Then ask yourself three sets of questions: