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Avoiding unnecessary jobs Avoiding distraction from the telephone

Distraction by casual visitors

Visitors can waste a lot of time.

Other people may not have as disciplined an approach to work as yourself. You may find that you are wasting time dealing with colleagues who stop to chat and gossip, are having time needed for intense concentration disrupted by assistants needing help on small matters, or are being pestered by salesmen.

You do not always need to be welcoming

In these cases you may find that you are being too welcoming. You can protect yourself with barriers such as closed doors, tables or desks. Similarly you can prevent people from settling by removing places where people can sit. Alternatively you can avoid eye contact or stand up yourself. These make it uncomfortable for other people to be in your space.

Where you are in a sufficiently powerful position, you may find it effective to refuse to accept interruption without an appointment. This is particularly effective with salesmen.

Letting people know not to distract you

You may have times when you do not mind being distracted - perhaps when you are tired, or doing jobs that do not require sustained concentration. At other times you may prefer not to interrupted, but may be happy to take interruptions if they are important. Sometimes you may be concentrating on difficult work where you do not want to be distracted unless the building is burning down!

If you have a PA, then he or she can screen you from visitors or phone calls. If not, then it may be useful to develop strategies to let people know whether they can interrupt you or not. To avoid telephone distractions you may consider putting your phone on divert, or 'leaving it off the hook'. When dealing with colleagues it is worth being light-hearted - some successful solutions have involved wearing arctic ear-muffs when they need to work uninterrupted, or setting up traffic lights where the colour of the lights shows whether people can interrupt or not.

Avoiding unnecessary jobs Avoiding distraction from the telephone
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