Trouble focusing could mean that your work is not complicated enough and that there is not enough of it. When you take on challenges that align with your abilities and interests, you feel more fulfilled and engaged by your work. You have invested a lot of time, effort and money to build your career capital, so use it. Consider,
- Are you working too little?
- Is your work too easy–or mostly pointless?
We distract ourselves with mindless tasks that make us feel productive.
Our work isn’t complicated enough, and there isn’t enough of it.” While people increasingly consider busyness throughout their lives a “kind of status symbol.”— Chris Bailey
To increase your focus, it helps to up your engagement. As I have shared previously, leaders can draw on their emotional intelligence to effectively engage employees. However, employee engagement is only half the responsibility of the employer–the employee has the other half. Moreover, employees can take steps to become more motivated–for example by better aligning their work with their goals.
If you find yourself bored at work, you probably need to up your engagement by tackling something more challenging.” — Daniel Goleman
Bored and distracted
If you don’t produce, you won’t thrive—no matter how skilled or talented you are.” — Cal Newport
If you often find yourself bored and distracted at work, take on more challenging projects. Boredom is a warning sign of disengagement. It is the opposite of diving into productive action. To help you to be engaged, find projects that excite you.
Moreover, find projects that you feel are slightly beyond your reach. You should dive in. Find a mentor to learn how to tackle these stretch assignments. When you take on challenges that align with your abilities and interests, you feel more fulfilled and engaged by your work.
Check for alignment daily
It is beneficial for you to develop questions to ask yourself daily to test your alignment with your goals. Ensure they are active questions. If needed reframe questions from passive to active. This approach puts the initiative on you, something you can control and not on your environment.
For a few examples,
- Passive — “Do I have a best friend at work?”
- Active — “Did I do my best to build positive relationships at work?”
- Passive — “Have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow?”
- Active — “Have I pursued projects that align with my interests and sought opportunities for growth?”
You will become more invested in and passionate about your work, by revisiting your goals daily and taking responsibility for your growth.
Beyond your control
There are some factors beyond your control. Your boss plays favourites, or a coworker does not pull his or her weight. However, by focusing on what you can control, you can find greater fulfillment in your work despite such difficulties.
When it comes to focusing at work, it is easy to blame your environment for your wandering mind. Social media, open offices, chat with colleagues are all distractions that lead to a state of mind that is not focused. Moreover, a frequent cause of disturbance occurs when your work is not complicated enough, or there is not enough of it.
This idea is not a popular one, especially with those who feel they are already working at capacity. A growing number of people see busyness, both at work and home, as a status symbol. However, this busyness is often an appearance for something else: You procrastinate by doing mindless, distracting tasks that make us feel productive, but, do little.
Can you change this behaviour?
Yes, however, you may need to take on more work and work on stuff that is a little harder.
If you are interested in something, you will focus on it, and if you focus attention on anything, it is likely that you will become interested in it. Many of the things we find interesting are not so by nature, but because we took the trouble of paying attention to them.” ― Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Complex tasks demand more of your working memory and attention, meaning you have less mental capacity left to wander to the nearest stimulating distraction. In his book “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience,” Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi argues that when the challenge of completing a task is roughly equal to our ability to finish it, we are most likely to enter into that state of total work immersion.
You get bored when your talent stack—skills, knowledge, wisdom, behavioural traits, and accomplishments— significantly exceed the demands of the work. Moreover, you feel anxious when the requirements of a task exceed your talent stack — understanding and pairing those abilities along with your micro-motives with a noble mission. It fully engages you in your work.
Learn to Hyperfocus
Hyperfocus is an attentional mode in which a task consumes your complete attention. Your mind wanders less often in hyperfocus as you are engaged. Moreover, you are more productive.
Besides questioning the complexity of individual tasks, reflect on whether you have enough work to do. If not, you are inviting distraction. I recall that most of the time I got myself in trouble at school, a frequent occurrence, occurred when I did not have any exciting work to do.
Think back to your last tight deadline. Were you scanning the news and refreshing Twitter? Likely not. On non-deadline days, it may be difficult to focus on the task at hand.
Parkinson’s law — your workload tends to expand to fit the time available for its completion. Tasks that should take a couple of hours to complete will take an entire workday if you have that time available.
Distractions are to blame including,
- logging into your social media accounts when you should have been working
- checking new emails and text messages continually
- attending meetings that you do not need to be a part of in the first place
You feel guilty when you are busy, so you alleviate this guilt by filling your time with busywork. Your guilt comes from the fact that you are working without intent.
Intention is the key to your productivity — when you have more to do than the time to do it in. Choosing what you do ahead of time becomes essential. Once you reduce your busywork, you will realize there is plenty of space for meaningful work. Take on more complex tasks.
Deep Work A Superpower in Our Competitive Economy
Passion comes after you put in the hard work to become excellent at something valuable, not before. In other words, what you do for a living is much less important than how you do it.” — Cal Newport
The research surrounding attention suggests that our mind focuses on anything that is novel, pleasurable, or threatening. Many tactics and tools have been developed to help you to minimize distractions, such as
- installing a distraction-blocking application for your computer
- clicking your phone on Do Not Disturb mode
- finding a quiet place
Cal Newport defines deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task. This skill allows you to quickly master complicated information and produce better results in less time. Deep work provides fulfillment. The ability to do in-depth work is a superpower in our competitive economy. However, few people can go deep. Instead, we are busy with e-mail and social media. You likely do not even realize that there is a better way.
Instead of arguing distraction is bad, celebrate the power of its opposite. In most professions, cultivating a deep work ethic produces massive benefits. Newport’s book, Deep Work is an indispensable guide for you if you are seeking focused success in a distracted world.
Time to Focus
Once you have removed distractions, you are forced to face your work. Moreover, you discover how much, or how little, you have on your plate. Think of it in the context of the 80/20 rule — one hour spent hyper-focusing is worth an entire afternoon of distracted work.
An Exercise
Take a few days to assess:
- How difficult is it for you to become engaged in individual projects?
- How much of your time do you spend on unproductive busywork?
At the same time, reflect on your energy levels. Busywork is a sign you need a rest. If your mental stamina is low, your mind gravitates to the most natural thing you can do.
We measure behavioural competencies that drive personal success and motivation. Two of these competencies are:
- Initiates Independently — Demonstrates a preference for acting, pursuing high risk and launching projects independently of prior approval or requests. There are four underlying traits that we measure to determine this competency: Initiative, Adventure, Self-Sufficiency, and Leadership.
- Focuses on Results — Making personal sacrifices and expending extraordinary dedication and work ethic for one’s career. There are four underlying traits that we measure to determine this competency: Industriousness, Career, Obligation, Efficiency, and Workaholism.
However, if you are falling victim to distraction, you should consider the possibility that you might need to work harder and smarter on projects. Doing so and the right ones, will both fill your days and enrich your life. Also, when understanding your behavioural DNA, you can manage your challenges and improve your overall competency.
Increase resilience and focus
Taking brief breaks between tasks throughout the day increases your level of resilience. Micro-breaks, which can range from a few seconds to several minutes, have recently been found to increase engagement. Taking a minute or two to regroup and clear your mind between calls, patients, or classes. Mini-breaks makes it easier for you to remain engaged throughout the day.
You can increase your focus for your work with attention training. Mindfulness, to return your attention to a single focus—such as your breath or a word or phrase—serves as a mental gym. With continued daily practice you can increase your ability to focus without distraction.
Concluding thoughts
“A joyful life is an individual creation that cannot be copied from a recipe.” ― Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
With a dark horse mindset, you:
- understand your micro-motives and your talent-stack
- have your antenna up and always looking for opportunities
- your strategies focus on building your talent stack to take advantage of the possibilities
- stay focused on the journey rather than the destination.
This mindset will serve you well.
It is difficult to understand your behavioural DNA — your power skills, without our assessment. However, it is essential for your understanding of your micro-motives and talent stack — the keys to career success. Being fulfilled and engaged at work needs you to be involved in activities that challenge you, are meaningful, and serve a useful purpose.
Challenge — What's Right For You?
Solution = Leverage Your Talent Stack + Build Your Career Capital
Identify your unique behavioural strengths, build your career capital and leverage your unique talent stack for lifetime success.
- Grow your leadership potential by targeting your critical developmental needs
- Determine your crucial career success factors, allowing for more focused efforts
- Discover your best and most successful career direction
- Find out about your strengths and interests in different career areas
Knowing yourself is the first step to being happy. Moreover, staying happy is an ongoing process of regrounding your long-term goals with your current objectives. When those align, you’re on the path to a job you can adore. Know when to find a better job as your best option may be to fall in love with your job (again) We also offer a personal development plan to help you achieve career success and satisfaction.