One Rule for Greater Productivity: Protect Uninterrupted Time

We have discussed goals and opportunities. This post is about improving productivity. Many approaches to workplace productivity are based mainly on management theory. #ImproveProductivityByGivingEmployeesUninterruptedTime The founders of 37signals approach productivity through brain science. From that perspective, the method is simple: protect employees’ uninterrupted blocks of time. Give people long, complete working periods. Do not let meetings, approvals, reports, or any small matter interrupt them. #AttentionIsTheBrain’sScarcestResource One brain-science finding is that attention is among our scarcest resources. It has especially high switching costs. If someone suddenly asks you to make a slide deck while you are writing, you cannot instantly put down the draft and begin. You need time to get into it. That preparation is attention switching—like emptying a bottle before filling it with something new. So 37signals has a cultural principle called protectionism: protect attention and leave people uninterrupted time. Avoid interrupting them with anything if possible. Its founders compare allocating time to spending money. Suppose you have a large sum and exchange it all for one-unit coins. You can buy only scattered little things: plenty of variety, but little value. Spend the sum in one go, however, and you can buy something important with lasting value, such as a car or house. Many people look busy, joining projects everywhere, yet achieve ordinary results. Those doing one thing often produce more because they manage attention differently. To the author, an hour and sixty separate minutes are entirely different. Time must be whole, not fragmented.