Book Byte #10 "A World Without Email" by Cal Newport
Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload
đŁ Curious Quotes from the Author:
âPerhaps Marshallâs most striking habit was his insistence on leaving the office each day at 5:30 p.m. In an age before cell phones and email, Marshall didnât put in a second shift late into the night once he got home. Having experienced burnout earlier in his career, he felt it was important to relax in the evening. âA man who worked himself to tatters on minor details had no ability to handle the more vital issues of war,â he once said.â
âIn this second part, I introduce a framework I call attention capital theory that argues for creating workflows built around processes specifically designed to help us get the most out of our human brains while minimizing unnecessary miseries.â
âWhile the ability to rapidly communicate using digital messages is useful, the frequent disruptions created by this behavior also make it hard to focus, which has a bigger impact on our ability to produce valuable output than we may have realized.â
đ Cognition of the Bookâs Big Idea:
In the Book âA World Without Emailâ, itâs discussed that if email and instant messaging were a thing of the past, it might offer a daring new vision of the workplace. It makes the case that, despite email's seeming necessity in today's knowledge-based workplace, it really reduces productivity, focus, and happiness for all users. A significant paradigm shift will be necessary to implement the solution, but the work will be well worth it.
Workers check their email on average every 6 minutes. The inbox becomes not as a storage of letters or communication, but storing a todo list.
A company called Rescue Time monitored the computer habits of 50,000 active users. The concluded with their data that an average worker gets 1 hour and 15 minutes of distraction-less work done per day.
It takes a toll when we rapidly switch between tasks, it ends up using a lot of ourâŚ
brain energy, and that lack of energy causes us to not multitask very well.
In the Tech Industry especially, the widespread use of email and instant messaging has resulted in an unhealthy workflow known as the hyperactive hive mind. Although this process may seem practical, it results in disgruntled workers who are noticeably less productive. Email should be less important in today's workplace culture, and workflows that promote efficiency, focus, and single-tasking should take its place.
đ ď¸For the Introverted
Email has always been a powerful tool for Introverts. It allows us to take our time and communicate the right way what we want to say, and having it as a Companyâs default communication theory helps us even more.
However, it can still grant us harm in the fact of it be distracting to us when we are trying to get some real focus work done. Slack and Other Instant Messaging services have caused even more distractions, but we need to keep experimenting till we find something that works for all of us to collaborate on.
đ¤ Collaborate with others with this Social Media Prompt:
What could you see yourself doing all day if you didnât have an email address? Would your life be better or worse?
You can pretend thatâs real life. Donât read or answer any emails until youâve done what you wanted to accomplish for the day and see after a day or two how less distracted you are and how much more focused you feel on your work.
Start the Digital Online Business of your dreams in 5 easy steps, all done for you: