Business Bites: Interruptions at work
Learn how to deal effectively with interruptions at work
What is an interruption?
An interruption can be described as a distraction that is deliberately diverting your attention and sidetracking you.
If you work with other people, it’s highly likely that on a regular basis you will suffer from interruptions. You shouldn’t be surprised when they happen and, as we see later, you can plan for them.
It is important to distinguish between valid and invalid interruptions though. A valid interruption could be your team needing your attention for an important task or question. Being available to your team in such times is important.
Types of interruptions
• External: interruptions caused by something outside of you, such as a colleague needing help, an unexpected meeting, or a phone call
• Internal: interruptions that originate within yourself, such as a sudden thought about another task or a distraction like social media
• Informal: common distractions that don’t involve a formal meeting or request, like a colleague stopping by to chat or someone using a chat app
How much of an issue can they be?
A University of California study found that after each interruption it takes more than 23 minutes to refocus. What’s more, if the interruption takes you onto something else, this multitasking can sap your brainpower – the equivalent of dropping 10 IQ points.
The negative effects of interruptions may include:
• Reduced productivity by impeding individuals’ ability to complete tasks effectively
• Increased stress caused by constant interruptions can lead to a sense of being overwhelmed and perpetually behind, potentially compromising work quality
• The inability to focus deeply on tasks can hinder creative thinking and potential innovation
• Frequent interruptions can cause projects to accumulate and workloads to become unmanageable
How should they be dealt with?
You can deal with some interruptions by setting aside time for regular meetings with teams and individuals. If they know that you have diarised time for them to speak with you, and understand that they can bring less urgent issues and queries to those meetings, this will help to reduce the ad-hoc interruptions.
An extension of this is to make known the times when you will be unavailable. This guarantees you protected time to focus on your priorities.
These protected focus times can be maximised by using one of the following methods:
• Grouping similar low value tasks together to be able to work through these and avoid them becoming interruptions to more important focused work that you have
• If you are working on several larger projects, you can utilise a day for each project and only focus on that area for that day. Day theming is the practice of targeting a different responsibility for each day of the week. Under day theming, each day has its own unique focus which helps to reduce context switching. Context switching happens when you take on new, unrelated tasks one after the other. Every time you mentally switch tasks; it takes time and effort for your brain to catch up
There will be times when you are unable to avoid interruptions. In such situations, it is best to set expectations with the person wanting your attention. For example, if you are working on something important, you could explain this and schedule in time for later; or say that they can “only have 10 minutes right now”. If 10 minutes is not sufficient, postponing the discussion could give all parties valuable thinking time
In her article, ‘How to manage (and minimise) workplace interruptions’, Chrissy Scivicque offers the following sound advice that can often be overlooked: “If you don’t want people to interrupt you, don’t interrupt them. Show respect for others by asking, ‘Is now a good time to talk?’ before simply launching into a conversation. Be a role model for the kind of behaviour you’d like to see from others. Don’t ping co-workers on IM with pointless chitchat if you don’t want them to do the same. You have the power to train others on how you want to interact with them simply by demonstrating the behaviour.”
Useful tools
In the article, ‘A plan for managing (constant) interruptions at work’, Leroy and Glomb propose the use of a ‘ready-to-resume plan’ to help workers maintain their focus on interrupted tasks whilst dealing with an interrupting task. Their experiments showed that individuals who took a small amount of time to note where they were up to on the original task, were able to give better focus to the interrupting task and then return to their original focus.
Leroy and Glomb’s process to implement a ready-to-resume plan is really very simple:
1. Before switching tasks, note your progress. Record where you were in the interrupted task, including any key information or tasks completed. Outline the next steps you’ll take when you resume the interrupted task. If there’s a deadline, make sure you have a clear plan for returning to the task and completing it in a timely manner.
2. Switch to the interrupting task. Focus your attention on the new task, knowing you have a plan for returning to the interrupted one.
3. When returning to the interrupted task, review your notes on progress and next steps to quickly reorient yourself. Pick up where you left off and resume the task with renewed focus.
Useful additional reading