In recent years I became a huge fan of deep work.
Deep work involves slowing the pace of our work to measured, concentrated periods of prolonged, focused activity. It is a time to focus, rejuvenate and feel refreshed.
For a long time I’ve believed in the ideal of deep work – that in today’s environment, made more frenzied by many competing demands and task switching – sometimes we just have to switch everything off and concentrate. If we want to progress something meaningful, this is the way to do it.
Cal Newport, author of Deep Work, says:
For a time, I tried to do just this.
I managed my diary tightly. I blocked out hours at a time for no interruptions.
Huge slabs of work started to get done. It was incredibly powerful. I even managed to write a couple of books this way – one of my great dreams to do!
Then the world changed.
Most people I know had every aspect of their lives collapsed together. All of what we knew – family, work, leisure, rest – became boxed in, most often within the dimensions of our houses, apartments or our local communities.
The points of separation that so neatly kept everything distinct, which also provide a foundation for practices around deep work, folded into each other like Paris apartments in the movie Inception.
So what changed in this new world? And why has it had such a profound impact on the way we work – as individuals and as teams. Two conditions shifted in particular.
The Two Conditions That Have Radically Changed
First, interruptions have increased. Where we used to get more time to ourselves, recently we have been continuously interrupted. Whether it’s the ping of the latest news unfolding (which, let’s face it, is hard to ignore) or the press of family commitments in the home, interruptions have increased.
Second, the amount of continuous mental noise has exploded. I have shared this concept with many colleagues and friends and all have agreed. We have faced a continuous hum of mental chatter – are we safe, are we achieving in our job, what is the state of the world, are we coping in this recent chaos – which has made it more and more difficult to concentrate as well as find moments of mental calmness during the day.
One of the great benefits of prolonged periods of deep work has been the immense satisfaction derived from focused concentration and the results this produced. With these kinds of sessions interrupted, this has eroded our sense of accomplishment.
Where we previously achieved much, and this thereby reinforced our sense of achievement, now we are continuously context-switching and picking up the threads of previously undone tasks.
If you have found yourself feeling less fulfilled and even slightly disoriented in terms of how you would usually approach your work, this is likely why.
Under these conditions, deep work became more a fairytale than a possible ideal for many of us.
For me personally, I found I grew stressed thinking about deep work, as it seemed at odds with the reality of both the demands and time available during the day.
How I Shifted My Pattern Of Work Through 3 Principles
I realised I needed to find another way. Or at least preserve the positive aspects of deep work and reject the aspects that were not working for me.
That’s when I thought about what made deep work, work.
- Uninterrupted periods of extended time
- Complete focus
- A sense of calm and achievement
My issue started with time. I didn’t have long blocks of it. I did however have lots of 20 minute increments.
I found 80% of the time I could get 20 minutes, but less then 20% of the time I could get a whole hour.
What if I could blend the principles of microhabits, small intervals of focused time, and deep work?
The first ting I did was to reduce the time to work on a task.
Focus On 20 Minute Tasks
Initially, it seemed impossible to achieve any type of deep work in only 20 minutes. For many things, we think we need to least 10 to 15 minutes just to switch off and enter the zone of a new activity, let alone complete the task.
Take this article for example. Usually, I would write a draft of an article like this in one uninterrupted sitting over several hours. Converting this to a series of 20 minute intervals seemed unlikely.
When I thought about this, I realised if I had a clear goal (specifically, a SMART goal) when I started the activity, I was more likely to find flow quickly. I liken this process to walking into a room.
If you know what you want before you walk into the room, you will have a target action straight away. Get a drink, for example, would lead to your first action, find where the bar is. This is very different from walk into the room and then assess your course of action.
Tasks can be approached in the same way. If you sit at your computer ready to write the second paragraph of an article, that is what you will do for 20 minutes. As opposed to, sit at your computer and think about what you will do first.
I also learnt that if I started an activity while listening to music, within minutes I could access the flow of the activity. Music provided a way to reduce mental chatter and calm my mind very quickly, so that I could focus on a task. What are the ways you have found calm your mind and let you gain clarity, quickly?
Principle 1: Whatever is worked on in a deep sense, has to also be possible in 20 minutes, with any additional time a bonus.
Rethink The Nature of Tasks
A ‘task’ is a very general term. A task can be completely operational, like ‘send an email’, or it can be strategic, like ‘sketch a new business model’.
To change, I had to think about activities not as long periods of time, but as broken down, specific tasks (within a larger activity) that could be done within 20 minutes.
One of the ways I did this was to make sure tasks were strategic and creative in nature. That is, I chose small things to focus on that were conducive to deep styles of work and representative of larger goals.
A pitfall of time management is to cram activity into every minute of our day, with little thought to whether this time is consumed on tasks that don’t require deep thinking.
I wanted to achieve the opposite, which is to use the little time available in ways conducive to deeper, creative endeavour.
Because of the time pressures placed upon us all through the circumstances of a global pandemic, I was looking for the best of both worlds – deep work that was possible in scarce time.
Achieving this was not simple. I had to shift my thinking.
Principle 2: Focus on creative and strategic tasks, and how these (when taken in series) add up to an important activity or goal.
Take A Deliberate Approach To Task Planning
This style of work required a deliberate effort toward task planning.
A Project Manager breaks down a project into actions and milestones. This is the same way I thought about plans for deep work.
I thought deliberately about tasks at two levels.
- First, how did specific tasks contribute to larger activities and goals.
- Second, each task required some habits or rituals as I started and completed the task, in order to ensure the task made sense in the context of larger pieces of work.
As an example, a starting ritual could be listen to music or start with a goal. An end ritual could be reflect on what has been completed or plan what task will come next.
The approach looks like this.
This practice allowed me to start a task with complete focus and calm, then leave it with a sense of achievement.
For every 20 minutes I spent on a task, I also then spent time assessing my progress on whether the larger activity was complete and whether I would need a follow on task to advance the activity.
It also gave me clarity about what I would work on next (when I had another 20 minute increment of time).
While this planning required time, I easily got back this time as well as an increase in mental clarity and calmness when approaching work.
Principle 3: Devote time to planning deep tasks connected to larger activities and goals. Start and end these tasks with rituals.
Feel More Calm, Accomplished & Accepting
While working like this took some getting used to, I found my time and work became far simpler to balance over the course of the last year.
I became less stressed and more accepting. I was able to return to highly productive periods of work, while sustaining a sense of achievement and fulfilment that comes with deep work. It was easier to find flow in my work.
By far the biggest adjustment was continually planning activities, breaking them down and then updating their status. Overall this has been a small price to pay compared with the alternative, where it was nearly impossible to get long periods of time for meaningful work.
I also had to become more accepting of circumstances. Interruptions happen. They’re annoying and they break flow. But they don’t have to be painful.
Part of the beauty of this revised technique to deep work is that, when interrupted, we have a good sense of what we’re working on and where we’re at with an activity.
So for me, when our child wanted to play, it was easy to stop the work and enjoy play, and just as easy to return to work during another 20 minute slot.
What are the ways you’ve used to be productive despite these shifting circumstances? I would be interested to hear your feedback. Leave a comment below or get in touch directly.
