Technology

Why Our Work Product Quality Has Gone Down And What To Do About It

Technology columnist Jeff Bennion argues that email has created an environment where we are forced to multi-task and be distracted -- but there are ways we can deal with this problem.

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The way we process our daily workflow has changed dramatically in the last 10 years. We have certainly seen several advancements in efficiency in how we work. But not all changes have been for the better. Sometimes we get so excited about all of the things we can now do at the same time that we lose sight of the fact that the goal is to work efficiently.

Let me explain.

A few months ago I was in a trial that lasted several weeks. The judge instructed us that we have to have our phones turned off during trial. Not on vibrate – they had to be totally off. The judge explained that he had received comments from jurors in the past that it annoyed them that attorneys were able to check their e-mail while opposing counsel is laying the foundation for their expert. Basically, if they had to pretend to be interested in everything, so did we. I triaged my e-mails at the break and at lunch, but at the end of each day, I had a bunch of unread e-mails. I would sit down at the end of the day and go through my e-mails. This would take me about an hour each night. After doing this for several nights, I realized that this hour or so of reading and responding to e-mails is interspersed throughout every work day of my life. I just don’t really notice it unless I have to sit down and do it all at once. It’s like entering your billing at the end of the month – you don’t really notice how much time it takes until you sit down and get caught up on it all at once.

E-mail has created an environment where we are forced to multi-task and be distracted. E-mail is different from phone calls for two reasons: 1) there is an assumption/understanding that you get the e-mail as soon as I send it, and 2) e-mail is much more tempting to our attention than phone calls. If someone calls me and I don’t want to talk to them, I just won’t pick up and I’ll listen to the voice mail later. If someone sends me an e-mail, even if it is a long e-mail, I can take a quick peek to see what they want. Because of that, we can get 60-80 e-mails a day. If we spend a couple of minutes responding to 10 of them and about 30 seconds to a minute reading the others, we have just lost a significant portion of our work day.

Effective Multi-tasking Is Impossible

UC Irvine did a study that showed that the average worker gets about 11 minutes between interruptions and it takes 25 minutes to get back into the zone of the original task. Investigating this phenomenon, the New York Times asked a professor of information technology and a psychologist at Carnegie Mellon to conduct a study to measure performance outcomes of people who get distracted while trying to read a passage and answer questions about it. The distracted group scored 20% less than the control group.

Now imagine you are writing a motion for summary judgment and you get an e-mail at 12:02 p.m. that there is a fruit basket in the break room. Then, at 12:13 p.m., you get an e-mail notifying you that Mr. Smith has reviewed his depo and did not make any changes. Then, at 12:18 p.m., you get an e-mail that there has been some case activity from ECF on one of your federal cases. At 12:20 p.m., you get an e-mail from the partner asking if you have a draft done yet. According to the study, you are going to be less focused even if you do not read the e-mails, because as long as your Outlook is open, you are in anticipation mode that you might get an important e-mail, so your focus is diverted.

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What To Do About It?

Let’s be clear. I’m not advocating that we go back to a telegraph system. I’m just saying that there’s a new problem that has come up and we need our problem-solving skills to catch up to our innovation skills. According to the Wall Street Journal, Intel has recognized this problem. I’ve never developed a microchip, but I’ll assume that it’s at least as demanding on one’s attention as drafting a motion for summary judgment. They have developed something called “think time” where they are not expected to respond to e-mails for hours at a time.

While this takes a lot of coordination within the company, there are other helpful solutions. Use your e-mail tool to create rules to filter out low priority e-mails into other folders. I have my inbox set up so that most of my non-coworker e-mails go to other folders. Then, I have my phone set up to not notify me of those e-mails.

Also, keep in mind that it’s okay to wait a little bit to respond to e-mails. If there is some major situation and you need to respond to an e-mail immediately and it’s been 45 seconds and you have not responded yet, someone will call you if it is imperative. If you can’t block out hours of time where you are e-mail silent, try to do it for at least 20 minutes or so. Come up with a system where you can mostly ignore e-mails, but still catch the important ones. You’ll find that you are able to get a lot more done than before and your work quality will improve 20%.

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Jeff Bennion is Of Counsel at Estey & Bomberger LLP, a plaintiffs’ law firm specializing in mass torts and catastrophic injuries. Although he serves on the Executive Committee for the State Bar of California’s Law Practice Management and Technology section, the thoughts and opinions in this column are his own and are not made on behalf of the State Bar of California. Follow him on Twitter here or on Facebook here, or contact him by e-mail at jeff@trial.technology.

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