Meet The Life Hackers

Rick Zeman writes "The New York Times Magazine has a fascinating article dissecting all of the myriad ways that people are distracted from their computers in the workplace, and 'how hi-tech devices affect our behavior.' From the article: 'Information is no longer a scarce resource - attention is. David Rose, a Cambridge, Mass.-based expert on computer interfaces, likes to point out that 20 years ago, an office worker had only two types of communication technology: a phone, which required an instant answer, and postal mail, which took days. "Now we have dozens of possibilities between those poles," Rose says. How fast are you supposed to reply to an e-mail message? Or an instant message? Computer-based interruptions fall into a sort of Heisenbergian uncertainty trap: it is difficult to know whether an e-mail message is worth interrupting your work for unless you open and read it - at which point you have, of course, interrupted yourself.' What could be done to change computing to help mitigate this multitasking?"

Comments

One thing I haven't succumbed to ...

[John Jorsett]

is using Instant Messaging when I'm working. All the other distractions are bad enough without a bunch of little windows popping up all the time. I don't know how people who use it stand it.

Hmmm. I suddenly have this mental image of me yelling, "Get off my lawn, you kids!" while waving my cane.

Re:One thing I haven't succumbed to ...

[Bitseeker]

Where I work, we use IM quite a lot. Both locally and overseas.

In the overseas case, it's often easier to understand folks via typed English so it's better than using the phone while still being more immediate than email.

In the local case, IM works well because

1. It's not as disruptive as a phone call. You don't have to answer a newly initiated conversation immediately if you're really busy (or just set your client to give a busy message).
2. It's faster than email when the person is there, but if you see that they're away, then you can fall back to sending email (the IM version of the answering machine message).
3. Unlike email, IM doesn't clutter your Inbox and Sent folders with myriad little messages resulting in a long thread to get rid of. IM's transient nature is an important feature so it's best used for communication of transient information, ideas, requests, etc. Of course you can always save the conversation if you need to keep it.

IM falls nicely between the telephone and email.

which interrupts the most?

[br00tus]

I wouldn't say e-mail interrupts much - I can read it when I want to. The most disruptive is someone walking into my office - you can't get away from that, although you can tell the person you're busy. A phone call is second to that, although you can just not pick up the phone. It also takes longer to punch in your access code and listen to a voice message then to quickly read an e-mail. Instant messenging would be next in line, although you can wait a few minutes (or hours) to respond to those. To me, e-mail is the least disruptive.

you still have to manage your own time

[yagu]

One of the most valuable one-day seminars I attended talked about some of these things. Basically (and though I didn't always adhere), the gist is no matter what the potential interruptions, you map your day and set your own schedule. If something is important enough for immediate interruption you will discover that soon enough.

Some of the highlights included:

• when you set your schedule for the day, block out an hour for yourself... that will show as "unavailable" to anyone trying for your time. (It doesn't have to be an hour, and it doesn't have to be every day, but it gives you a block of time to handle things you want to do without interruption.)
• put your briefcase or purse (or SOMETHING) on the "guest" chair in your cubicle (or office). This proved one of the biggest improvements in my control of my day. People have a tendency to see an empty chair as an invitation. In a ten year span, I'll bet I only had ONE person who actually walked in, moved my briefcase without asking, and sat down.

As for determining whether to immediately respond to e-mail or phone calls, these today pretty much provide the interface to allow you to at least filter at the "arrival" moment, e.g., an e-mail client that enunciates the "sender" and the subject, or caller-id on the phone indicates if it's someone you NEED to answer.

Treat email as low priority

[mccalli]

From the summary:
it is difficult to know whether an e-mail message is worth interrupting your work for unless you open and read it - at which point you have, of course, interrupted yourself.' What could be done to change computing to help mitigate this multitasking?"

At work, I've taken the approach of turning off all notifications that I have new mail. That way I avoid the problem above - I don't know there's anything to interrupt me, so no interruption occurs. Higher priority is given to (work-related) IM and higher priority is given to a phone call. Note that 'higher' doesn't automatically guarantee I'll drop what I'm doing to answer, but you have the second-best chance of getting my attention. The very best method? Be at my desk and speak to me. That's not practical for all situations of course, working from home springs to mind as do remote offices etc., but for my normal work-day that's a fine approach.

My following the order above has resulted in me getting time to concentrate and think a lot more, and and I'm working better for it I feel.

Cheers,
Ian

Manage your environment

[Matt Perry]

No sooner had she started one task than a colleague would e-mail her with an urgent request; when she went to work on that, the phone would ring.

This sounds like she doesn't know how to manage her environment. I'm reminded of the people that say they hate cell phones because they can be reached anywhere as if there's nothing they can do about it (hint: don't answer it or turn it off).

If you are working on something that requires your focused attention then turn off the distractions. When I'm coding at work I turn down the phone ringer and hit the send calls button so that everything goes to voice mail. I also close my email program so I'm not bothered by email notices or tempted to check email.

Treat e-mail as an inbox for tasks

[JaredOfEuropa]

Remember those trays people used to have on their desks in the 70's? The ones marked "in" and "out"? You can see how they work in old movies... a clerk sits at his desk, working at a task, and when he finishes it he puts the completed task in the "out" box, and gets the next task from the "in" box.

One of the lessons I learned in dealing with many people and many emails at once, is that you have to treat e-mail a little like an old-fashioned "in"-box. You look at it only after you finish the task you are currently working on. Your inbox requires processing (not just reading): set aside time for this task. It can be twice a day, 5 times a day, or whenever you feel like it; the right moment depends a great deal on the nature of your work. Just as long as you remember that reading email is a task in its own right, and should not be done alongside anything else.

Another good rule to keep is that you have to process the entire inbox, once you get started on it. That's right, it should be empty after you have processed it. If you keep older read items alongside new messages, at some point you'll probably just give up and cry "I get way too much email". Simply process them one by one, each will require one of the following:
1) A short action, say, under 2 minutes. Take this action right away (quick and easy replies, noting appointments in your calendar, things like that).
2) A longer action... anything over 2 minutes or anything that requires a lot of thought. Stick these emails in an "action" folder and get to them later (when you are back into "action" mode).
3) No action. The email can be deleted or archived if it has info you'll need later.

A simple and nicely mindless process... 30 minutes will probably get you through 100 emails, and you will have a good idea about the priority of each of the ones in your action folder.

This is simply about being organised and not allowing interruptions. The hardest thing might be to not read your email while doing other things. Just shut down your email client so you cannot see incoming new mails. If there is something really important, people will call you if you don't respond within 30 minutes, believe me.

Speaking of interruptions... if the nature of your work is such that interruptions can really mess you up (coding springs to mind), turn off e-mail and IM. If you are blessed with a good office phone system, you may also be able to turn your phone off and redirect it to voicemail.

I got this way of dealing with communication tools from the book Getting Things Done; a great book on time management in general. The tips in this book have helped me getting from a state of feeling swamped in work, to feeling relaxed about taking a 2-hour lunch to let some material sink in, or just ignoring emails, things like that. (Yes I am still doing the same amount of work).