Distractions

How many people look back at the end of the day and say where did some of my time go?

I think a lot of people do that and there are a number of reasons why we lose part of our day and don’t realize where it goes. The availability of social media now is making it so easy to stay that I am just going to get something quickly and then get back to work. The quick check really isn’t that quick a check because you can end up wasting a great deal of time either following the articles on Facebook and the various links on Twitter. Yes, there two social media platforms can really take a to of your day away from you without you realizing where the time has gone.

There are a number of companies that block both Facebook and Twitter from being accessible through the business internet and it is only available to those that there are part of their job. I have heard some people complain because they think that they should be able to connect to their social media at any time they want not realizing that it is really taking away from their work time. There are even companies that fawn on the use of a personal smart phone during the work day and that is because that is another way of checking the various social media platforms.

Another distraction that is in the work place is the social conversations that go on either around you and with you involved. These are interruptions that take you away from your actual work and then it takes me some time to get back to what you were doing. Yes, a conversation may only be 5 or 10 minutes but then how long does it take for you to get back and remember exactly what you were doing before that conversation.

Email can be considered a distraction as well as part of your job. What is important is not getting distracted too often when you see that you have a new message. In some cases the best thing to do is not have the notify icon on your desktop so that it isn’t flashing and letting you know that you have new email. If you can get into a routine of checking email at various times during the day and then dealing with all the messages at once you will find you will be able to get more done throughout the day.

Yes there are tons of distractions that can interfere with our work day and we just need to figure out how to manage them. The social media is one thing that really needs to be handled because that can really distract you for a lot of time so if you are at work even if it is allowed through the internet make it your own personal practice to either not check it at all until you are home or only check it during your lunch. Managing the distractions can be a challenge but understanding what they are can make a big difference.