Increase Your Productivity – Gain Traction Amid Endless Distractions

Increase Your Productivity – Gain Traction Amid Endless Distractions

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Raise Your Productivity & Decrease Your Stress – Gain Traction Amid Endless Distractions

Grant Ian GambleBy Grant Ian Gamble | May 12, 2020

Grant Ian Gamble is a business growth consultant, executive coach, author and keynote speaker. He works in a broad array of industries helping companies build teams, navigate change and drive growth.

Many of us are working from home for the first time and it’s amazing the distractions that occur throughout the day. Everything from those chores that nag at us through to kids needing help with their online studies. It can often feel like you’re trying to get a lot of things done and none of them seem to get completed as efficiently as you’d like. As we’ve personally watched our kids tackle online school, it’s been fascinating to witness the same thing happening with them.

Our kids are teenagers and they’re rarely detached from their smartphones. In fact, more often than not, they combine this attention distraction device with their laptop or a TV screen. They would argue that they’re absorbing the content while Snapping and chatting with friends simultaneously, but our observation over time is that they’re definitely paying a price for dividing their attention.

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Blog | Raise Your Productivity - Get Traction Away From Distraction | Multitasking

Even though “multimedia-ing” is the new norm, over time splitting your attention between multiple sources of stimulation, combined with the rapid change of pace that these formats provide, deteriorates your ability to carry out more sustained tasks. 

Researchers have proven that comprehension decreases and switching between tasks comes with additional costs, including loss of speed (up to 40%), decreased efficiency (as much as 4x less efficient at completing tasks), and learning does not take place while you’re multitasking. Researchers have also proven conclusively that a higher incidence of errors occurs when we’re dividing our attention between two or more tasks.

As much as we might rail against the notion that we can’t do multiple tasks simultaneously, neuroscientists have made it abundantly clear that the brain cannot process multiple comprehension tasks simultaneously. Rather, the brain switches (just like an on and off button) between tasks. Even when we’re doing very ‘different’ tasks like driving and talking on the phone, performance is impaired significantly. 

Beyond compromised performance, there are many other prices to pay for trying to do multiple tasks at once.

THE DOWNSIDES OF MULTITASKING

1. Negative impact on your short-term memory

Your brain’s “Scratchpad” is used to manage and focus on key information and when you’re multitasking and switching between tasks this short term information storage area becomes garbled and impacts your working memory.

2.  Increased stress and anxiety

Neuroscientists say that multitasking causes you to lose focus and become more anxious. This in turn drains your physical and mental resources.

3. Inhibited creative thinking

When you lose focus and become stressed, you lose your ability to think creatively. You’re taking away the opportunity for your brain to digest or come up with new ideas.

4. Stops you from getting into the flow

Flow is a state where you’re absorbed by the task you’re focusing on. Time becomes irrelevant, stress levels decrease, and productivity increases exponentially.

5. More mistakes and less productivity

Even simple tasks take longer when you’re constantly switching from one activity to another. Mistakes occur and you get less of the things you need to do done.

The key is to accept the fundamental fact that the mind can only do one thing at a time.

And ditch the device when you’re trying to complete a task or be in the moment.

Certainly, this is easier said than done. Brain research indicates that our addiction to texts, Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, Twitter, Google and email has a physiological cause–the body’s emission of the chemical dopamine (known as the “pleasure seeking molecule”). Our brain gets pleasure when we seek and find new information, so it chemically encourages this behavior (enter dopamine).

If you want to get tasks done at a higher quality level and in less time, it pays dividends to focus on one activity at a time. This is called Single Tasking and there are some real benefits to this concept.

THE UPSIDES TO SINGLE TASKING

1. Single tasking decreases stress levels

When you expend more energy trying to multitask, you end up exhausted and behind on work. When you focus on one thing at a time, you’re more likely to actually finish what you wanted to, and in turn lower stress levels.

2. Single-tasking helps you focus on what you have to do and not all the tempting distractions

Choosing something to focus your attention on for a set period of time means saying no to other distractions. This helps you focus on the important stuff you need to get done and will rebuild your ability to focus.

3. Creativity increases when you single-task

Single-tasking actually frees up brain resources to think more creatively. This helps with idea generation and coming up with solutions to problems.

So how do we change the habit of multi-tasking to a more productive and creative single-tasking process? Here are some tips:

TIPS FOR CHANGING THE HABIT OF MULTITASKING TO MORE PRODUCTIVE AND CREATIVE SINGLE TASKING

1. To break this constant stimulation from your devices, experts say turn off the audio and visual notifications built into your devices that alert you to the presence of more information. But mostly, just draw a line in the sand and commit to one thing at a time.

2.  Another solution is to set a timer for 25 minutes and aim to work continuously for that time. Knowing that you only have to focus for that block of time will help to focus your mind. After 25 minutes, set a timer for a five or ten-minute break. Rinse and repeat. Just like building muscles you can build up the blocks of time and stay focused longer.

NOTE: When you take a break, grab a drink or a snack, get some fresh air and stretch, check your SnapChat or whatever it is you follow or like, but don’t get bogged down in another task – this is meant to be a break where your mind can wander. When your break timer goes off then come back to the task you were working on before. These breaks are important, because mental performance drops if you don’t take breaks. Decision making slows, attention levels drop, and creativity decreases.

We actually did this exercise with our 15-year-old son and his ability to complete assignments and finish work that he’d been struggling to complete went through the roof. In fact, he started completing a day’s work in just two or three single-tasking blocks of 25 minutes each.

3. One other solution is changing brain states through mindfulness meditation. This can reduce dependence on various forms of multitasking and help improve focus. 

Research has shown how mindfulness meditation improves brain function within 1 ½ to 2 months of practice

A simple breath meditation can be done anytime and anywhere. This is especially helpful if you’re stressed or frustrated. Here’s the basics: 

  1.     Take one DEEP breath in. 
  2.     One SLOW breath out. 

Start with 10 breaths to start with. The longer breath out induces the parasympathetic nervous system. This means you’re changing from a stressed state to a more relaxed and composed state. Use this whenever you feel yourself becoming overwhelmed.

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Blog | Raise Your Productivity - Get Traction Away From Distraction | Productivity

Getting focused and productive is much like fitness. You can build your performance and endurance over time. It is critical to reward yourself as you progress and not feel like the ultimate achievement is 100% productivity. Getting to a point where you can complete projects and tasks with a minimum of distractions is a powerful achievement. Remember that the rest-breaks and distractions we mindfully engage in will actually improve your productivity over time. 

The real benefit is that being present and engaged in one activity at a time will enhance your memory, decrease your stress levels, enhance your creativity and improve your efficiency and productivity.

It’s amazing what you can achieve when you can consciously focus your attention. The rewards are enormous.

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Blog | Raise Your Productivity - Get Traction Away From Distraction

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Change Management During Uncertain Times

Change Management During Uncertain Times

Change Management During Uncertain Times

Grant Ian GambleBy Grant Ian Gamble | April 17, 2020

Grant Ian Gamble is a business growth consultant, executive coach, author and keynote speaker. He works in a broad array of industries helping companies build teams, navigate change and drive growth.

I first experienced the joy of sailing as a cadet at the Royal Australian Naval College. Harnessing the power of the wind was both challenging and exhilarating. Since those days of sailing Bosun’s Dinghies around Jervis Bay, I’ve sailed everything from windsurfers and kiteboards all the way up to a 48-foot catamaran on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. 

The one indelible constant in sailing is the ever-changing conditions that demand continuous course corrections and adjustments to the sails and rigging. The wind constantly shifts direction or speed, demanding ongoing course corrections. Currents and tides under the boat influence its path and again demand regular adjustments from the skipper.

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Author | Speaker | The Affinity Principle | Change Management Appraisal

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Constant Change & Mindful Communication

This volatility very much reminds me of the current state of the world. As information regardig COVID streams in from hundreds of countries across the globe, the ever changing trajectory, path and profile of this crisis demand constant adjustments to our course.

So how do we approach the ebb and flow of information and the constantly shifting parameters we’re faced with today?

As with the sailing analogy, this is an inexact process.

It requires trial and error and the ability to adjust course or expectations constantly. It may even require many companies to pivot in directions that they would have never contemplated. 

Managing change at this rate is incredibly stressful and difficult. More than ever, it demands great communications between your team, customers, the community and stakeholders.

In times of turmoil developing and maintaining regular, relevant and rhythmic communications with your communities will bring many benefits:

1. Routine and rhythm will help establish a sense of trust with your constituencies. 

2. These communication rhythms will bring awareness around issues and will help develop solutions and facilitate change.

3. These rhythmic communications give you opportunities to recognize your team and simultaneously better understand the challenges that they are facing in this new world order. 

NOTE: Communications should not be limited to work and professional issues. It helps for your team and constituencies to discuss the personal and sometimes unique circumstances they’re facing.

4. Given that many of your team members may be working remotely for the first time, these regular communication opportunities may reduce a feeling of isolation and keep those team members more in touch.

5. Sharing of information and knowledge through regular conversations and briefings can also enhance relationships between teams and creating a variety of groups and forums will help solidify your team and company in these turbulent times.

Constant Change & Clarity

Beyond collaborative communications are the strategic elements of navigating these treacherous waters. Much like Jack Sparrow on “Pirates of the Caribbean,” you need a compass that points toward that which you desire to accomplish.

My point is that you really need to have clarity about where you’re headed. And I don’t mean those rocks that appear all around you! I mean what is the ultimate destination you seek when this crisis resolves itself? 

Regaining clarity around your ultimate destination beyond this crisis will inform the course corrections you need to make now. As information comes to hand and options appear and disappear, you will need to maintain clarity around your final destination in order to navigate the many challenges that stand between where you are today and where you want to be at the end of this crisis.

Constant Change & Strategy Adjustments

In order to redefine the goal/s for your company in the face of these turbulent times, I recommend engaging your stakeholders in the conversation. It also makes sense to engage thought leaders in this dialogue. By bringing in talented third parties that have helped companies navigate crises and re-births, you improve your chance of weathering this storm.

There will be a level of attrition in business that occurs as a function of this pandemic. There will also be opportunities that are inevitably a by-product of chaos. If you beef up the depth and rhythm of your communications and develop and maintain clarity around what you want to achieve at the end of this mess, you stand a much higher likelihood of coming out the other end intact.

I wish you clear skies and an open ocean . . . 

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The Affinity Principle™ by Grant Gamble presents a formula for business success through a people-centric, mindful leadership approach.

PEOPLE FIRST, ALWAYS.
Overcoming F.E.A.R. During COVID Uncertainty

Overcoming F.E.A.R. During COVID Uncertainty

Overcoming F.E.A.R. During COVID Uncertainty

Grant Ian GambleBy Grant Ian Gamble | April 15, 2020

Grant Ian Gamble is a speaker, author, and business coach. He works in a broad array of industries helping companies build teams, navigate change, and drive growth.

 

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Blog | Virtual Training During and Beyond the COVID PandemicThe acronym for F.E.A.R. is False Evidence Appearing Real. 

 

When you’re dealing with the unknown, facts are changing daily, experts are predicting very different outcomes, and the media, politicians and your own predilections are distorting the information you’re processing. This makes it really difficult to discern false evidence from real facts.

In defense of all the stakeholders in the distribution of information, no one has an incredibly clear picture of what reality is right now, and they certainly have no idea about what the outcome will be in the future.

When we’re facing a very real threat to ourselves, our families and indeed our way of life, fear can rise up pretty quickly.

On top of these very personal threats to their wellbeing, my consulting clients are faced with additional fears. Fears for their team members’ wellbeing, fear of their loss of ability to serve their customers, and fear for their businesses and livelihoods. 

These are seriously stressful times!

As I’m working with my clients in these uncertain times, one of the most important roles I fulfill is to try and sift through the fear-based information and the fact-based information.

That might seem really straight forward, but often it is not. 

Fear creeps in when things change. Change in and of itself creates fear.

Very often, the fear change generates is misplaced and never comes to fruition. But that’s easy to say, harder to determine and very hard to convey when people’s backs are against the wall.

Fear Paralysis

Recently, I was working through options with a senior manager for a company I am working with and I kept hearing his mind’s projections into the future where he was re-inventing and re-experiencing realities that did not and might never exist. He was telling me why we couldn’t shift to virtual training and why we had to hunker down and hope that this all goes away really quickly. And that the best we could hope for is that this would someday seem like a bad dream.

He was completely paralyzed by fear and couldn’t see his way through it. As a result, he shut down and refused to think creatively.

Wishing and hoping this crisis away is a lot like playing the lottery. You know it’s not likely (in fact it’s damn near impossible) but you hope anyway.

What we need to do in times like these is look at the unvarnished truth as we know it today: 

  1. This thing is not going away anytime soon
  2. Everyone’s in the same boat
  3. Hunkering down and not taking affirmative action is foolish
  4. Assuming the worst is also a fool’s errand
  5. Not preparing for the worst is even more foolish

The truth is that we need to tackle this crisis on an hour by hour, day by day, and month by month basis.

We can’t project an end to the suffering, but we can plot a course that allows for a number of potential end points and work towards those with focus and determination.

As some of those endpoints pass us by and we are still in crisis mode, we need to realign our next set of projections and focus once again.

There is no predicting the likely outcome of this spiraling mass of chaos, but as with the Chaos Theory, very small changes can have far reaching impacts.

Chaos Theory

In the Chaos Theory, initial conditions are considered extremely important. If you look at the response by countries and states across the globe, you can see that where early and affirmative action was taken, outcomes improved more quickly.

This is a great lesson: early and affirmative action

A second element of the Chaos Theory is unpredictability. One thing we know with certainty is that the ultimate outcome of this global event cannot possibly be predicted accurately. If for no other reason, the sheer magnitude of variables in a global event like this make predicting an outcome impossible.

The lesson in this is to focus on the things you can change and don’t get distracted by all the variables that are out of your control.

It is easy to get consumed by the what ifs and let the overwhelming amount of information cloud our view. Fear stalks us all in these challenging times and channeling your focus, time and energy into productive pursuits is tough.

If you’re struggling to see any light at the end of this long tunnel, I would suggest you focus on the process and not the outcome. Take action where and when you can.

And don’t get caught up in the things that remain unknown or out of your control.

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Virtual Training During and Beyond COVID-19

Virtual Training During and Beyond COVID-19

Virtual Training During and Beyond the COVID Pandemic

Grant Ian GambleBy Grant Ian Gamble | April 7, 2020

Grant Ian Gamble is a business growth consultant, executive coach, author and keynote speaker. He works in a broad array of industries helping companies build teams, navigate change and drive growth.

Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Blog | Virtual Training During and Beyond the COVID Pandemic | StudioI have spent a great deal of time in front of teams and audiences presenting training, workshops and information. I truly enjoy the visceral experience and connection this creates for me and my audiences.

With the onset of the Coronavirus, scheduled trainings and conferences started dropping off everyone’s calendars and huge holes emerged in ongoing education and training programs. What a strange turn of events and yet a great opportunity to embrace the many benefits of virtual training.

I have worked with several online training platforms in the past and was familiar with the efficiencies and conveniences afforded by virtual modalities.

Now, I find myself having to truly embrace these options and schedule virtual trainings for clients to continue programs that were already in motion, or to add new programs.

As I started building more online resources, fitted up a sound recording studio, and tried various platforms, I became acutely aware of the many acknowledged and unacknowledged virtues on virtual training.

 

1. Scalability

Virtual Training allows the number of participants to increase or decrease without causing logistical challenges. In a classroom or auditorium, obvious physical limits exist. Virtual training can work for 2-3 attendees, or thousands.

2. Accessibility

Whether your participants are in Charleston or Sydney, they can participate in a virtual training session. This is hugely beneficial to companies with team members scattered over the country, or the globe. 

3. Affordability

There are many financial benefits to virtual training, including savings on travel costs and venue related expenses. Depending on the type of training, adding additional participants represents incremental cost increases.

4. Convenience

When the training is being delivered in real-time, the participants can log in from home, onsite, or a remote location. When the training is pre-packaged, participants can take part at a time that’s convenient for their schedule.

5. Improved Retention

When the training is being recorded, or when it is prepackaged, the participant can review the content at their convenience and this can help improve their retention of the information. This asynchronous format can provide time for participants to absorb and review that they wouldn’t have in a real-time scenario. This format also allows for smaller bites to be consumed and for microlearning to make more financial sense in this forum.

6. Increased Participation and Engagement

Online training platforms allow for chat forums, rating tools, pop quizzes, and other participation tools. For those participants that are less likely to interact in a classroom situation, the virtual realm can be less intimidating. There are also tools for participation monitoring that can ensure the participant is engaged.

7. Immediate Feedback

Online training platforms can provide immediate feedback to participants and facilitators to ensure that course content is being absorbed. This real-time feedback helps comprehension and course development.

8. Blending Facilitators

With virtual training, facilitators can contribute from other cities, states or countries. This can add perspectives to training that may not be easily replicable under normal circumstances.

9. Customization

The virtual training platform allows for customized content, just the same as in-person delivery. And because of feedback mechanisms, real-time content can be melded to meet the participant’s needs equally as well.

NOTE: Rarely do I deliver ‘packaged content’ and the discovery process with a client allows me to customize content to get the optimal outcomes. Custom virtual training should also be preceded by virtual meetings with stakeholders to ensure the content is on point and relatable.

As with all things, there are also some drawbacks with a virtual interface and here’s a couple to be aware of: 

  1. This learning experience may feel less personal for some participants. 
  2. Interfaces can be problematic, bandwidth can cause problems, tech is not always seamless.
  3. There is a reduced direct interaction between participants which is good during a pandemic, not so good for shared learning under normal circumstances.
  4. There are very limited opportunities for team building exercises. 
  5. Poor quality sound or visuals can make the experience lackluster.

I am always going to enjoy the opportunity to interact with my audiences in person, but virtual training is a very real part of our lives these days and can offer many advantages. 

As a member of the business community, you’re likely reconsidering how you do business and what training and education might look like in this new era. Those of us that provide training and education are also needing to consider our options and will no doubt have to invest in more virtual training offerings as the Coronavirus pandemic unfolds. 

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Grant Ian Gamble Business Consulting | Author | Speaker | Business Consultant | Coach |The Affinity Principle | Best Seller Logo

The Affinity Principle™ by Grant Gamble presents a formula for business success through a people-centric, mindful leadership approach.

PEOPLE FIRST, ALWAYS.