8小时工作制正在扼杀你的工作效率

    想办法让我们的大脑“暂时离开一下”，可以让我们保持专注，更好的完成任务。

    领导力内部网络是一个在线社区，最有思想、最具影响力的商界人士将在此回答关于职业与领导力的问题。今天我们的问题是：对于如何在工作中保持效率？以下为Turnstone公司总经理布莱恩•夏普兰的回答。

    电子邮件通知，响个不停的电话铃，同事津津有味吃午餐的声音……在你读完这篇文章的过程中——当然，如果你能够坚持读完的话——至少有其中一件事会干扰你的思考；威胁你的工作进度、质量和效率。

    作家戴维•罗克在《别把脑袋放冰箱》（Your Brain at Work）一书中提到，办公室员工平均每三分钟便会被打断一次，而要从被打断的状态中恢复过来，需要付出很高的代价。事实上，一项任务被打断后，我们平均需要23分钟才能完全恢复到正常工作状态。此外，神经科学的研究结果，也确认了我们已知的一个事实：人类大脑无法连续八个小时保持精神高度集中。大脑也会疲劳！为了使我们能够对周围的环境保持警醒并做出响应，我们的大脑也要有活动与休整的周期。事实证明，要通过掌握这种周期来提高工作效率，可没有那么容易。

    根据脑科学研究的事实，面对信息的狂轰滥炸和进行多任务处理的诱惑，我们该如何实现平衡？我们如何最大程度地提高工作效率？

    过多信息会降低工作效率

    精神病学专家，作家爱德华•M•哈洛韦尔的研究显示：“从古至今，人类的大脑从未像今天这样，需要跟踪如此多的数据点。”所以，马上回复短信或电子邮件，会增加压力和挫败感，进而影响工作效率。因此，我们应该每天安排出特定的时间，用于查看电子邮件。此外，想办法展示关键信息，以便于查询。将数据张贴在附近的白板或磁性防窥片上，意味着你不需要在一大堆文件当中翻找，因为这项不必要的工作所需要的时间，会超出你的想象。

    练习正念

    事实上，你可以重新训练大脑的专注能力。正念可以帮助你的思想适应当时当地的环境。事实证明，这种练习可以解决琳达•斯通在20年前所提出的“持续性部分注意力”问题。例如，在我们的办公室，音乐可以激发团队的活力，创造出一种轻松的氛围，但许多人也需要短暂的休息。因此，我们提供了一些空间，让我们的大脑可以“暂时离开一下”，以便之后更有效地工作。在负责需要高度专注的任务时，我们的员工通常会寻找安静的角落，或者与办公区域隔开的休息室。这些选择既适合单独工作，也可以向团队其他人发出信号，委婉地表明“请勿打扰”。

    站起来，活动筋骨

    运动科学及其对大脑的效果是有据可查的，但Turnstone的调查发现，仅22%的创业者表示，他们的员工感觉公司支持他们在工作时间追求健康的工作方式。设计需要移动的办公室布置，并为团队规范积极的行为，是一个重要的起点。

    用笔来记笔记

    印第安纳大学的研究发现，我们在使用纸笔的时候，神经活动会迅速增加。所以，我们应该将数字笔记放在一边，捡起上学时用笔来记笔记的习惯。比如，我们可以将关键绩效指标和营销信息展示出来，以保持信息透明，传达工作进度，或根据之前的想法进行头脑风暴等。这样做可以形象地展示我们已经取得的成就，以及我们未来希望实现的目标。

    熟练运用云技术

    不论你使用哪一款云文件存储工具，你都应该熟练使用它，并充分利用它所带来的便利。进行实时沟通和更新项目文件夹时，我们的团队主要依靠云存储工具，因为它可以避免相同文件、数据表或幻灯片的反复移动。使用云技术节省的时间，相当于你撰写许多电子邮件的时间。

    做真实的自己

    如果你试图模仿他人或者做自己不擅长的事情，你便很难保持专注。正因如此，许多办公室才会重视初创公司文化的真实性，90%的受访者认为，办公室文化对于员工的效率、创造力和工作满意度至关重要。在我们公司，这意味着悬挂家人朋友的照片，在每周的站立会议上分享个人和职业上的成功，并承认我们都有迥然不同的工作方式。（财富中文网）

    译者：刘进龙/汪皓

    审校：任文科

    Find ways to ‘get away without going away’ to keep yourself focused and on task.

    Leadership Insider is an online community where the biggest names in business and beyond answer timely career and leadership questions. Today’s answer for: What’s your best advice for staying productive at work? is written by Brian Shapland, general manager of Turnstone.

    Email notifications. Buzzing phones. The sound of your coworker munching on lunch. Chances are that by the time you finish reading this article—if you even get that far—at least one of these distractions will have derailed your thoughts; threatening deadlines, work quality and overall productivity.

    In his book Your Brain at Work, author David Rock says that the average office worker is interrupted every three minutes, and recovering from this disconnect is costly. In fact, it takes us an average of 23 minutes to fully return to a task after an interruption. That said, discoveries in neuroscience also confirm what we’ve always known: our brains aren’t wired to concentrate intensely for eight hours straight. They get tired! Our minds work in cycles of activity and downtime designed to keep us alert and responsive to our surroundings. But harnessing those cycles to promote productivity proves challenging.

    So how can we balance the onslaught of incoming information and the temptation to multitask with the reality of brain science? What can we do to maximize our productivity in the office?

    Too much information stalls productivity

    According to research by psychiatrist and author Edward M. Hallowell, “Never in history has the human brain been asked to track so many data points.” That’s why responding immediately to a text or email only increases stress and frustration while decreasing effectiveness. Instead, schedule specific times throughout the day to check email. Additionally, find ways to display key information for easy reference. Posting data on nearby whiteboards or magnetic privacy screens means you won’t find yourself sifting through documents unnecessarily, a venture that always consumes more time than you anticipate.

    Practice mindfulness

    You can literally retrain your brain’s ability to focus. Mindfulness, the practice of keeping your thoughts attuned to the here and now, has been shown to combat the “continuous partial attention” as Linda Stone first talked about 20 years ago. In our office, for example, music energizes our team and creates a fun vibe, but many of us need moments of respite, too. That’s why we’ve created spaces that let us ‘get away without going away’ so our minds are better able to function. Our employees regularly seek out private enclaves or physically separated lounge settings for high-focus tasks. Both of these options support solo work and send a subtle “do not disturb” message to the rest of the team.

    Get up and move

    The science of movement and its effect on the brain has been well documented, yet turnstone research shows that only 22% of entrepreneurs say their workers feel encouraged to pursue healthy choices during the day. Designing office floor plans that require movement—and then modeling active behavior for your team—are important starting points.

    Take notes by hand

    Research from Indiana University shows that neural activity spikes when we put pen to paper. So embrace your old-school ways and ditch digital note taking. For example, we display key performance indicators and marketing messages to keep information transparent, communicate progress and brainstorm off previous ideas. This helps us visualize what we’ve already accomplished and what we hope to accomplish in the future.

    Get your head in the cloud

    Regardless of which cloud-based document storage tool you use, get familiar with one and leverage the convenience it offers. Our teams rely heavily on this for real-time communication and for constant updates to project folders, eliminating the back-and-forth of various versions of the same article, spreadsheet or slide deck. The time that’s saved is matched only by the number of emails you’ll save when you use the cloud.

    Be authentic

    It’s hard to focus on anything when you’re trying to be someone—or something—you’re not. That’s why so many offices are embracing the authenticity of startup culture, where 9 out of 10 people identify culture as incredibly important to employee productivity, creativity and job satisfaction. For us, that means bringing in pictures of friends and family, sharing personal and professional victories during our weekly stand-up meetings, and acknowledging that we all work in different ways.