He Might be on to Something

In my attempt to stay informed about current trends and ideas, one thing I've done for the last while is have the latest blog postings from Seth Godin delivered to my inbox.  While I will readily admit I file 90% of them into my "Read Later" file (who has the time to read everything?), I've been able to read a few more of them this last month and was intrigued by the idea he presented today.  Here's a few quotes:

"More and more, we're finding it easy to get engaged with activities that feel like work, but aren't."


"One reason for this confusion is that we're often using precisely the same device to do our work as we are to distract ourselves from our work. The distractions come along with the productivity."


This rings true to me.  I remember during the last half of my MBA I found that I was spending more and more time playing, surfing, etc on the computer when I should have been working.  The result of course was that it took me twice as long to get the things done I needed to.  This can happen too during work where I can get sucked into aimless surfing or reading online when I should be producing.  I rationalized it at times as being a mind break, or a way to ease into the day.  In the end though inevitably the time I take on "break" gets longer and my productivity decreases.  


For me the "why" was pretty simple.  In the case of the school and job distractions I was getting mentally and physically tired (of the routine and the effort required) and this type of behaviour was easy to zone out on.  This was also a signal for me that my work-life balance is out of sync and that my energy needed to create and innovate was running low.  I was chasing feeble sources during the wrong times to replace that energy with the result being the reduced productivity that Godin is writing about.


Here's the solution that Godin proposes:


"Simple but bold: Only use your computer for work. Real work. The work of making something.

Have a second device, perhaps an iPad, and use it for games, web commenting, online shopping, networking... anything that doesn't directly create valued output (no need to have an argument here about which is which, which is work and which is not... draw a line, any line, and separate the two of them. If you don't like the results from that line, draw a new line)."

Nice idea if you can afford it right?  Let's not miss his key idea here though which is a good one.  Draw the line somewhere.  Find it, do it, and change it if necessary in order to make it work.  Make some differentiation between what you need to do and what you want to do and whether it's an iPad, a second office space (my local Starbucks was the solution that worked for me), or something else unique to your context; make the changes necessary.  My guess is that when the work-life balance starts to return, the difference between need and want will start to disappear and that most of what you end up doing will be work that makes something.  


It makes sense to me.