Here’s the challenge: do you value your time (a.k.a. your life) enough to place some parameters around how it gets used? Or do you find it easier just to go with the flow, crossing your fingers that it will all get done? How well is that working for you?

If you’re like many of our readers, you probably struggle with finding ways to make yourself available to colleagues and clients yet also get your work done so you have some time left for your life and loved ones.

Let me share a little truism with you: The less time you have, the more wisely you will use it. This is our variation of Parkinson’s Law, which states that ‘Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.’ We have all experienced the validity of this law when we pulled off a great term paper the night before it was due. There’s nothing like a looming deadline to help us tune out distractions.

Enough Chit-Chat

The law applies to our social tendencies as well, i.e. ‘Conversations expand so as to fill the time available for their completion.’ If your door is always open, your phone is always on, and your chat status is a free-for-all, there will be no end to the interruptions and distractions you are battling. Whenever somebody else is bored or stuck, they will seek out the easiest path to their own procrastination: always-available-you.

Sound familiar? Let me share some tricks to help you change this by establishing what we call ‘Com-Free Zones.’

These are chunks of time each day when you block all communications and focus on – well, whatever YOU want to. This could be a critical task or project…but it could also be going to the gym without being tethered to your boss via the Blackberry at 8 p.m.

Defined Working / Available Hours

When do you work? When are you off work? Did you know there was such a concept?! Just decide, and stick to it – at least publicly, anyway. If your hours aren’t fixed by someone else, set them for yourself – especially if you work from home. If you are a corporate professional, decide when you start and when you finish, and don’t respond to email and text messages outside of those hours.

People will catch on. Even your boss will catch on. You say you’ll lose your job if you do this? Hmmm….so how long are you going to live under that sort of pressure? 5 more years? 10 more years? And what will the payoff be for that? Just asking…

OK, here’s a cheat for you. If you occasionally chose to work ‘under the radar,’ e.g. after the kids are in bed, in the early morning or evening, don’t let everybody know about it! Queue your email messages to be sent out when your official working day begins. If you are careful and consistent about this, your workmates will start to adjust to your rhythm, and you will find your life again.

Control Outgoing Communications

“We have met the enemy and he is us.” So said Walt Kelly, and so say I about how we distract ourselves as much as the other guy.

I will put my hand up here and say I am as guilty of this as the next person. I will be working along and suddenly decide to make a call or send an email, check in with someone via chat, etc. Sometimes my communication is directly relevant to the work at hand, i.e. I need some information before I can move forward. But most of the time it’s nothing fancier than boredom or procrastination.

So when the only enemy to my productivity is actually me, my trick is to completely shut down all communications channels. That means I close (not minimise) Outlook and Skype, and I set all phone notifications to still and silent. Then I put my phone away so I don’t see it flashing. I am always amazed at how many times I try to click over to my email or reach for my phone. When neither is handy, I remember that I’m supposed to be working on something! So I make a note of what I need to do online or on the phone, then get back to work.

Even though I’m a productivity consultant, I have to play these tricks on myself. Maybe they will help you as well.

What’s Your Threshold?

I understand that you really need to be in touch with your colleagues and clients. I hope you understand that you really need time to focus and also to be not-working.

So let’s agree to a little experiment. Think realistically about how long your team, your boss, or your clients can reasonably wait for a response from you during the work day. Is it 20 minutes? 40 minutes? 2 hours?

Now try it. Test yourself and your work environment to see what happens if you are not available by phone, chat or email for that length of time. Find your threshold, commit to it, and use those golden minutes to actually get something meaningful done.

For tips on how to help people cope during your ‘extended’ absences, read Create a ‘Front Office.’

Filed under: Flow, Focus, Productive Routines, Time Management, Work/Life Balance