Minimizing Distractions to Get More Done
Photo by William Iven on Unsplash
Last week, we talked about single-tasking and how it is essential to being productive and reducing stress. And you might have been thinking, yes, that sounds great, but part of the reason why I’m always multitasking, even if I don’t mean to, is because I’m easily distracted.
The fact that you get easily distraction is not your fault. We are living in a time when we have 200 times more data coming at us every day than we did 30 years ago. But there is something we can do about it. We can set ourselves up for success, we can change the default settings, and we can exert a bit of control over our environment.
I want to give you some real strategies that you can implement for eliminating those pesky distractions that we all know can derail our day if we are not careful. Distractions are killing our productivity. And we have to be proactive if we want to change that. Studies show that when we are distracted or interrupted, it takes us, on average, 23 minutes to regain focus (23 minutes!) and that we are interrupted or distracted every 11 minutes. This means office workers spend up to 1/3 of their workday recovering from distractions. Imagine if you had an extra third of your work day back every day…to actually work!
I find that there are 3 main sources of distractions:
Other people (someone tapping you on the shoulder, or office background conversation),
Ourselves (when we stop mid-sentence in a document to go check our email) and
Technology (the addictive pull and the constant beeps and pings).
This is the 1st of a 3-part series on how to minimize distractions, and in this one, let’s just talk strategies for minimizing distractions from technology, because I bet that’s the most pressing for most of you.
First, let’s just start by saying that technology is AMAZING in SO many ways.
But it’s also designed to grab as much of our attention as it can get via default settings. If we want to be in control of our technology instead of it controlling us, then we need to be proactive about our settings.
So, what can we do?
Turn off all those app notifications on your phone (except those you really need which are usually only text notifications and meeting notifications).
Yes, all of them.
Yes, email and Slack, too.
You can check your email and Slack as often as you want (although I recommend only a few times a day), but you want to do it because YOU choose to, not because a message just showed up.
Of course you still need to be responsive, but you can check your email every few hours, and check Slack perhaps every 30 minutes to an hour and still be responsive. It’s only recently when there was even the possibility of being immediately responsive, and in most places, while it’s seeped into the culture as an implicit expectation, it’s not actually necessary.
Turn off desktop notifications.
Yes, email and Slack, too.
See above for reasoning.
Silence your phone while engaged in deep focus activities.
Nope, vibrate is not the same as totally silent.
Move your phone out of your line of sight.
In your bag or a drawer is best, and if you can’t do that, then face down on your desk.
Set your browser homepage to something boring (like Google)
Avoid clickbait! You know, when you sit down at your desk to do something specific and somehow, it’s 45 minutes later and you’re totally up to speed on Reddit or the New York Times, but you didn’t actually do the thing you intended to do? Avoid that.
Move those really tempting apps on your phone to a folder that you label something like “time sucks” or “think twice” and move that folder a few swipes in on your phone.
This simple act of making it more than one click or swipe away provides JUST enough of a buffer to make you think twice, and avoid mindlessly accessing our addictive feeds.
And don’t worry, I’m not saying you should never look at these apps. I’m JUST suggesting that it’s a good idea to do it mindfully. You want to be in control of when, and for how long, you’re accessing these sites and apps instead of the other way around.
Try implementing even just one of the options above and see how it feels. You can always reverse the decision. But I bet you won’t because you’ll be getting so much more done.
Next week, we’ll talk about how to minimize distractions coming from other people.