Distractions in the Workplace

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, workplace reporter Rachel Emma Silverman discusses the distractions bombarding the modern workday, which often prevent us from efficiently accomplishing our tasks. Such distractions could be questions from co-workers, personal discussions, seemingly ceaseless meetings and internal emails. Plus, the popularity of social networking has led to workers interrupting themselves. Academic studies have found that workers experience interruptions approximately every three minutes; once interrupted, it can take up to 23 minutes to get back on task.

With so many interruptions, many workers scramble to get their real work done early in the morning or late in the evening. What can be done to minimize interruptions and make the workday more efficient? Some companies have employed the following methods to cut down on workplace distractions:

• Use the telephone more. Employees communicate almost exclusively over email. The ease of emailing can cause workers to communicate with coworkers more than necessary. It also creates the time-consuming task of managing an overflowing inbox. Abbot Vascular, a unit of the health-care company Abbot Laboratories, instructed workers to begin using their telephones to discuss urgent and complex issues.
• Phase out internal email. At the IT services company Atos, management decided to phase out internal emails entirely after discovering workers spent an average of two hours a day managing their email inboxes.
• No devices during team meetings. Workers at eBay Inc. were instructed not to use cell phones or other devices, which has made meetings more efficient.
• Block out time for heads-down work. Managers at the computing technology company Intel Corp. instituted such a program for their Software and Services group, blocking out several hours a week for their employees to work without attending meetings or responding to emails. This allowed employees to spend time on more complex problems and to catch up on work they were unable to get to during more chaotic workdays.