Do You Have The Courage To Be More Productive?

You might ask what bravery has to do with productivity.

American culture celebrates “busy-ness”. When people are asked how they’re doing, they often respond “So busy!” And wouldn’t we all be embarrassed to say otherwise? Imagine the looks of horror if you said, “Not at all busy!” Many, but not all, retirees seem to need to be busy too.

In order to show that you’re a caring person, you’re expected to drop everything you’re doing to help someone who asks. Even if it doesn’t make sense for you to do it right then and there. (This tends to be more of an expectation of women, but men get it too.)

Many people also believe that it’s good customer service to pick up a phone call or answer an email right away… even if that means interrupting the work they’re doing for another client.

Managers are generally supposed to have an “open-door” policy, which means they’re always available if someone feels like dropping in on them. (Note that “open-door” doesn’t have to mean “open-all-the-time-door”.)

And so on. Our cultural norms reward busy-ness, not productivity. They’re designed for constant interruptions, forcing everyone to switch tasks back and forth in order to look like they’re helpful, caring, managing, or whatever. 

Of course, all of this is terrible for productivity.

Busy is not productive. If you prefer the satisfaction of being busy … putting items on your to-do list just so you can check them off… and if you like the status quo, then you’re not ready to max out on your productivity. 

Getting work accomplished has nothing to do with timeframes, though it does involve better time management

Consider all the companies that are rescinding the right to work from home. If workers still meet their goals while working at home, what’s the point of having them in the office? Management needs to see butts in seats for at least 8 hours, but that’s irrelevant to productivity. That’s management refusing to let go of the old ways. 

Even though there is no science or evidence behind a 40-hour week, management and owners cling to it like it’s some kind of guarantee that people only do the work properly if they hit the minimum magic 40 number. In reality, life doesn’t work like that, and most business owners know that on some level… and yet. 

And yet.

It feels like going out on a limb when you do something different from what everyone else is doing, like managing by results instead butt-in-seat time. There are exceptions for those who are in retail or hospitality where the measurement really is in hours worked. But if you think about it logically, for most businesses built on brainpower, measuring results and not time stamps is what will propel your business forward.

Interruptions prevent productivity 

On average it takes about 23 minutes to get back to where you were after being interrupted.

Notifications, especially email notifications, absolutely destroy productivity for everyone. Noises, pop-ups, and vibrations force you to take your attention off what you’re doing. Every time an email comes through, if notifications are enabled, you’re wasting more than a third of an hour.

Yet how many insist that emails must be answered right away? I know we were all trained that way. Does that mean it’s true? For most people and businesses, no. A simple automated email that acknowledges receipt will suffice. 

This is a hard stop for many people I talk to. Even though very few businesses absolutely must answer them right away to make sure that clients are satisfied.

I’ve also had people tell me that they have to answer their phones right away (if they’re in a job like real estate) because if they don’t answer right away, someone else will get the listing. 

Here’s my question: what do you do when you’re on the phone with an existing prospect trying to close the sale and someone else calls or emails you?

Do you put your current caller on hold and pick up the other line (or email) right away to let them know you need to call them back? Or do you wait until you’ve finished with the current client to call them back? If you email them back to let them know that you’ll return their call when you get off the phone, then couldn’t you just send an autoresponder email that would do the same thing?

I always tell my clients to let their clients know that they’re changing their email policy so people know ahead of time that the response time will change. Almost everyone who’s made the change has seen positive results. And still, so many resist doing this very simple tool to be more productive. You have to be brave to try it out.

The myth of multitasking

I’ve written about this myth ad infinitum. Any piece of (legitimate) scientific research will tell you there is no such thing. Instead, the brain switches back and forth very quickly between tasks, so while you believe that you’re multitasking, you’re not. 

The research also shows that multitasking is tiring for the brain. You know you get more accomplished when your brain’s fresh as opposed to all tired out. So why would you waste your time multitasking, especially when it’s unimportant things like status updates or administrative tasks? 

The answer is that corporate America has made it a badge of honor to multitask (or at least look like you are.) So you have to be brave to turn away from the status quo to get tasks accomplished one at a time. 

The courage to change the things you can

The status quo is to stay busy, which can often be accomplished by making sure you’re regularly interrupted so completing tasks takes twice as long (at least!) as it needs to.

Oh, and if you want to be more productive, someone is happy to sell you some software. Get productive without spending more $$? Why, that’s unAmerican!

So when you actually get productive, when you start working with your brain instead of against it so you can accomplish your goals and have a life full of joy and impact, you’re contradicting messages from society and corporate America. 

I get it, not everyone wants to do that, and that’s fine. You might decide that opting out of the status quo just isn’t for you. Totally okay, just recognize the tradeoff.

Want to be brave? I can help you, at least when it comes to working with your brain for a powerful boost in productivity.

Want to stick with the status quo? I can’t help you, but you will find productivity tips and tricks online that will probably help you around the margins. You won’t find a sustainable boost to help you be more effective, but you might be able to make some small changes here and there.

Recap (tl;dr):

You can be busy, or you can be brave. If you choose to work with your brain, you might have to give up on society’s gratification to do it. Transformative change of any kind requires bravery.

Click here to schedule a complimentary call to see if I can support you in your courageous journey.