I’m not an inefficient person; I get a lot done and I’ve never been accused of being lazy, but I’ve known for a long time that I am pretty good at wasting time when I’ve got more important tasks to do. So when I recently popped into the local bookshop and saw a book called The Procrastination Equation on the shelf and when I read the blurb and discovered that it wasn’t a self-help book but rather a serious summary of research on this topic I had to buy it. After all, I needed something to be looking at whilst I should have been doing something more important…
The book is written by Dr Piers Steel who, according to his own words, is an internationally leading expert on the topic having researched it (properly) from all kinds of different angles. And it was a good read with some really interesting findings and a nice simple basic premise – the equation of the title which I am not going to outline here because if you are interested you should read it yourself.
I particularly liked the destruction of modern technologies such as the internet and electronic mail because their time draining properties are well known to me. Apparently, research shows that on average it takes 15 minutes to “recover” from the interruption of an email and this is then equated to 2 hours wasted per normal working day. This is very nicely quantified by expressing this as being like starting work each year on 1st April (i.e. wasting one quarter of the year). Obviously that analogy isn’t exactly right but it makes you think.
The sections on simplifying your working environment, removing extraneous piles of materials and having prominent reminders of why you work (what you work for), also resonated with me and I will be looking to throw out a huge amount of “stuff” ahead of an office move this summer.
The bottom line message, of course, is really just another example of something that has been in my head for a while now, in relation to responding to climate change and keeping fit and healthy, namely: we know what we have to do, so we just have to get on and do it…
Tim O'Hare 