Many years ago I was working in an environment where I got interrupted constantly. I’d get up to answer a question when someone called me over, and before I could get back to my seat, three other people had questions. I’d spend hours doing laps around the room. My boss noticed this and stuck me in a room by myself and told the whole team they weren’t allowed to talk to me. He designed one person as their way to ask me a question, with the assumption that the questions would get answered before it made it to me. I got so much more done. Things that would have taken a week were done in a day.
Some time later I ended up back in a shared environment and generally used my hood (on the hoodie I usually wore) as my “do not disturb” signal. If my hood was up, I was working on something and probably shouldn’t be bothered. It was a completely unconscious thing I did; I even do it when working from home. As I enter a flow state or go deep into thought, the hood goes up without fail.
I also found stepping away from the desk to be extremely helpful when stuck on something. I could beat my head against the wall for 4 hours… or I could go for a walk for 20 minutes, and probably solve the problem in 5 minutes when I get back.
I’ve also found vacations immensely helpful for solving problems, especially the really big ones. If I take 2 weeks off I usually come up with all kinds of ideas and answers to work problems. I write them down to get them out of my head, so I can go back to my vacation, but come back to work with dozens of ideas and solutions. This doesn’t happen if I only take 1 week off. I’m about to have my first 2 week stretch off since 2018. I can’t wait. There has been a lot of build up.
The managers who treat knowledge workers like factory workers really don’t understand the nature of the work.
We obviously don't need private offices, given that most of us have been getting by without them for a long time now, but it sure was better for us when that was the norm.
Some time later I ended up back in a shared environment and generally used my hood (on the hoodie I usually wore) as my “do not disturb” signal. If my hood was up, I was working on something and probably shouldn’t be bothered. It was a completely unconscious thing I did; I even do it when working from home. As I enter a flow state or go deep into thought, the hood goes up without fail.
I also found stepping away from the desk to be extremely helpful when stuck on something. I could beat my head against the wall for 4 hours… or I could go for a walk for 20 minutes, and probably solve the problem in 5 minutes when I get back.
I’ve also found vacations immensely helpful for solving problems, especially the really big ones. If I take 2 weeks off I usually come up with all kinds of ideas and answers to work problems. I write them down to get them out of my head, so I can go back to my vacation, but come back to work with dozens of ideas and solutions. This doesn’t happen if I only take 1 week off. I’m about to have my first 2 week stretch off since 2018. I can’t wait. There has been a lot of build up.
The managers who treat knowledge workers like factory workers really don’t understand the nature of the work.