“Interruptive� Technologies Draining Knowledge Worker Productivity, Says Basex

2 thoughts on ““Interruptiveâ€? Technologies Draining Knowledge Worker Productivity, Says Basex”

  1. Luis – I really enjoyed your thoughts on this. Over the years, there have been tremendous gains in productivity due to the technology created…yet these same productivity tools also create the interruptions that harness and slow productivity. I think you have a good idea about doing studies into productivity. I think the truth lies in the middle. Certain knowledge workers have professions that require constant interruption, and where technology has increased productivity to a marked degree, and well beyond the detraction of interruptions…..yet other professions, or other types of knowledgeworkers (such as scientists, programmers, executives have to function in such a way were they manage their interruptions and manage their technology…otherwise, I think it works in the opposite direction…the cost is greater than the productivity. Thank you for this post….very thought provoking! I, myself, had only been looking at the interruption aspect…THanks.

  2. Thanks a lot, Tom, for dropping by and for the feedback comments ! Great input ! I agree with you 100% that there are certain professions that would tolerate less well the different interruptions than others and I think that indeed those knowledge workers need to be more aggressive about how much they would want to tolerate them. I can think about multiple ways of tackling this, perhaps, indicating a particular time of the week where interruptions would be welcome and then for the rest of the time just focus on the tasks at work. Or just decide when you are going to have an open window for people to come and ask you questions. I think that those professions should be taking into consideration how they could get affected by them and what the consequences would be of not being able to manage their interruptions.
    Perhaps it is not happening at the level we would hope for, perhaps we are just getting so many of them that it is impossible to manage them any longer. One thing for sure is that depending on the needs of the knowledge worker he / she needs to be able to put a hard limit on them if they would want to get their jobs done and it might well be where we are still struggling, in some professions, in setting up the limit. I know it is not an answer solution but we need to be able to find ways to address this and before it is too late. Maybe technology could help out a bit in this particular case, who knows.

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