Distractions at work can be a good thing after all…!
We hear much talk about how many distractions and interruptions there are to our concentration at work. Emails pinging, phones ringing, colleagues talking, social media luring us away from the task in hand….conventional wisdom questions how we ever get anything useful done.
A lot of effort is focussed on how we can minimise distractions at work, but new research suggests that positive distractions may actually help our performance at work.
Positive distractions are defined as those which are less disruptive as it is not imperative that we pay attention to them; they are likely to be used as a break from work between tasks, or to help us manage boring or repetitive tasks.
Positive distractions apparently include listening to music, watching funny videos or looking at amusing pictures – bring on the crazy cat photos then eh?!
So, if you trust your staff to work hard and to do the right thing, maybe you don’t need to insist everyone takes out the earphones and switches off Facebook after all….