How to Keep Focus Amid Myriad Distractions (INFOGRAPHIC)

With advances in telecommuting technology, working from home has been steadily gaining momentum in recent years. The onset of the Covid-19 pandemic saw a sudden spike in the number of employers letting employees work remotely.

Despite the popularity of homeworking and 91% of remote workers feeling more productive, distractions are rife in homeworking environments.

Keep Focus Despite Distractions

With workplace dynamics changing, it’s more important than ever that workers don’t give into distractions. To help employees maintain focus in new working environments, Nonprofit Colleges Online published an infographic. The infographic was commissioned by NowSourcing, an infographic agency that specializes in data visualizations and interactive infographics.

The ‘How to Keep Focus Despite Distractions’ infographic outlines the many distractions of modern workspaces. It provides tricks and tips to help employees keep focused when working in remote environments.

Culture of Distraction

According to the infographic, 99% of employees say they are distracted daily. 93% of workers cite video conferencing as the primary distraction. 51% say they are most distracted by phone calls.

Why We Can’t Focus

The research looked at the reasons behind workers’ lack of focus. Stress, multitasking, sleep deprivation and a busy environment, are leading reasons for an inability to focus at work.

Generational Divide

NowSource’s study explored how different generations feel about distractions and focus in modern workplaces. 74% of Generation Z and Millennials are distracted at work. 69% of these age groups admit their smartphones are one of the biggest distractions.

Baby Boomers admit to feeling more productive in a quiet space with less going on. Three times as many Boomers are unable to concentrate in an open space compared to younger generations.

Working from Home

The study found that because of coronavirus many are working remotely for the first time. More than 50% of recipients have concerns that household distractions prevent them from working. 84% of workers say they can refocus in less than 30 minutes. However, even small distractions can increase workers’ chances of making mistakes.

Optimizing Your Work Environment

The infographic provides a series of tips on how to optimize a work environment. Turning off notifications on phones is recommended as notifications can disrupt thoughts making it difficult to get back on track.

Three hours a day is spent checking work email and two hours looking at personal emails. Cutting down on checking emails could therefore be an effective way to stop wasting time.

Writing down tasks in order of rank and importance can help workers focus on what is most urgent. Prioritizing tasks can help employees stop wasting time.

To help remain productive and focused it is recommended to take a 15-minute break from the screen every two hours.

Tech to Retain Focus and Productivity

The infographic looks at the tech available to help people maintain focus and productivity in modern workspaces.

Freedom.to is an effective tool to assist workers in setting up lists of website and apps that can be distracting. Freedom.to blocks access to such distractions during scheduled times of day.

Trello enables employees to list tasks and separate products by board to keep track of tasks and projects. Noisli provides custom background to drown out unpleasant noises that could prove distracting.

Image: Nonprofitcollegesonline