Focusing on what matters.
Employees face numerous threats to their productivity, performance and wellbeing at work. The evidence consistently highlights workload and its management as a major source of stress. Without engaging with workload thoughtfully and intentionally, employees can quickly feel overwhelmed, leading to all the negative consequences of job-related stress.
However, it’s not just the volume of work that employees have to cope with. They also need to manage overwhelming volumes of email and instant messages. They have to navigate time spent in meetings, dealing with spontaneous problems, and managing their attention in the face of distractions – internal and external.
These challenges underline the importance of intentional workload prioritisation and building productive focus.
Why time management isn't enough
Many employees facing too much to do and too little time, will start to engage in some form of time management. This often neatly divides up the working day and week, with a nice plan to get it all done. But this approach neglects the other perspectives on managing workload.
We all come to work with three essential, and limited, resources: time, attention and energy. It’s the intentional investment of time, attention and energy in work that makes the difference. The difference between a fulfilling and productive day at work or a day spent dealing with distractions, putting out fires, and leaving work feeling like you’ve made zero progress on the stuff that matters.
This is because not all work is created equal. Compare 30 minutes spent at a team stand-up meeting and 30 minutes spent on the phone with a particularly demanding and upset customer. Similarly, what about the difference between an hour facilitating a one-to-one catch-up with a high-performing employee with an same time explaining to someone why they’re now on a performance improvement plan.
The various tasks on any professional’s to-do list will require differing amounts of time, attention and energy – so understanding how to invest these across the working day and week means priorities get dealt with, focus is maintained where its needed, and you feel like you’re actually making progress.
How can I manage workload better?
There are a number of practical skills that we cover with our clients. Clarifying workload is key – getting nice and specific about the work to be done and breaking it into actionable tasks. Watching out for any tendency to procrastinate is also important – and a lack of specificity over what’s to be done can contribute to this.
Once clarified, we need to prioritise our workload and ensure we’re distinguishing between urgency (which can grab our attention) and importance (which speak to the impact of the work to be done). Yes, tasks can be both urgent and important, for many requests we receive can be effectively scheduled once we can see past the implied urgency – and focus on tasks that will really make a difference.
Prioritised tasks can also help us understand the progress we’ve made when we look back at the working day, draw a line under our efforts and move on with a feeling of accomplishment.
How can teams prioritise more effectively?
Prioritising work best at the team level when team members are using the same approach (i.e. urgency vs importance) and can categorise work consistently. An appreciation for interdependence between team members and between teams themselves is also important. This helps reminds us that perceptions of urgency aren’t always shared or even objectively true.
In very practical terms, when a team can visualise workload using a share tool (e.g. a kanban board or shared task management app), it enables them to have a better appreciation for each other’s workload and what really represents a priority at any given time.
This last point is critical: priorities change as we learn more and new tasks come our way. So flexibility in prioritisation is essential – today’s urgent tasks can become tomorrow’s optional tasks depending on events.
How can employees improve focus at work?
Our focus is dragged away from our priorities by a combination of internal and external distractions. Some are under our direct control, while others require a level of acceptance. When it comes to external distractors, employees can remove or reduce those that are within their control (e.g. turning off notifications on devices, using headphones to reduce ambient noise). We can also detract from our focus by multi-tasking, so concentrating on one task at a time is a more effective strategy – and pays off in terms of quality and efficiency.
Internal distractions include all the kinds of thoughts and emotions that take us away from the present moment. Thoughts about the past, worries about the future. These aren’t under our direct control, like turning off notifications.
But we can learn to navigate them sustainably, to bring focus back to where it matters. In part this is about cultivating a mindful focus on the present moment, and also learning to see our thoughts and emotions as passing experiences – not new tasks for our list, which have to be ‘dealt with’ before we can move on with our day. This is called ‘cognitive defusion‘ and is one of the core components of development psychological flexibility.
Finally, everyone needs to be realistic about their expectations when it comes to focus. It’s not limitless and taking regular breaks throughout the day can help us manage our focus, get refreshed and return to demanding tasks.
How we can help
Our productivity focused coaching and training gives employees the skills they need to navigate demanding workloads and all the mental experiences that serve as distractions.
One-to-one coaching can help employees build their focus on the present moment, understand and minimise their procrastination habit, and introduce productivity systems and skills into their toolkit.
Our productivity training can help teams build effective ways of working based on priorities, collaboration and appreciation for differing working styles.
Our psychological flexibility training helps employees connect with the present moment, deal effectively with distractions, and steps back from disruptive thoughts and emotions, to ensure they get the stuff that matters done.