Man Interrupted

You’d be forgiven for thinking that email had been around forever, but it wasn’t long ago that the fax machine and the common letter were still the main forms of communication. I read on a colleague’s blog that she remembers when she started work she had to share an email account with another employee. When I started working in PR in the ancient days of 1999 I spent most of my first internship standing by the fax machine sending information to journalists and clients.  

Hard to believe in a world dominated by online communications with email now the mainstay for us all. Why am I talking about email? Well, some research has been released by a guy called Dr Thomas Jackson and he works at Loughborough University in the UK, according to him email is a huge distraction that beaks our train of thought. He has some interesting findings and reckons that it takes us over a minute to get our concentration back after we’ve received an email which equates to eight and a half hours a week of “what was I doing again..” type thoughts for those of us that check our email every five minutes. 

MyTake – I’m not sure what concentration is any more! I get “interrupted” by emails, phone calls, Instant messages, tweets, questions….the lot. I think that they average person has a more fluid sense of concentration that is more outcome based, i.e. what are the tasks at hand and when do I need to achieve them by. But, I am not a doctor and Thomas Jackson is, so check out his website for tips on managing email. Just a thought though Doc, what about a study looking at instant messaging and micro-blogging?