There are the interruptions that occur from others and then there are the ones that we do ourselves. Interesting, isn’t it. We can get so annoyed by interruptions and yet a study has found that about half of our interruptions, we create.
The effects of interruptions on you and your team:
Estimated to cost US Economy $588 billion a year.
When employees were asked to calculate the time they lose to interruptions they estimate up to 40-60% of their most productive time at work.
A study of knowledge/technology workers found that 82 percent of all interrupted work is resumed the same day, but it takes an average of about 23 minutes to get back to the task.
Interruptions can cause significantly more stress. The study found that if you know you are going to be interrupted you work faster, but the cost of that speed is higher levels of stress.
Interruptions that are most counterproductive are those that occur that have nothing to do with what you are working on and you have to switch your cognitive resources to completely different topic.
In another study of up to 26% of interruptions were classified as “organizational issues”.
Interruptions by co-workers is one of the biggest culprits of workplace interruptions.
Ideas for how to handle interruptions:
EXERCISE with your team this week:
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