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The importance of 'quiet time' when writing Here is a back issue of Marketing Booster, the email newsletter that Richard Groom writes and sends free every fortnight to subscribers. You can subscribe here or read over 60 back issues using the back issues index page. Now and again somebody asks me a question that stops me in my tracks and makes me think. It happened last week when, while delivering one of my 'writing for the web' training courses, an attendee asked: "What do you do when noise and other distractions make it hard to write?" The question reminded me of when I worked for a large company in a busy office with the almost constant sound of phones ringing and people talking. And of course nowadays I still face the distraction of the phone and emails coming in all day. A similar issue was raised in an article in the Guardian newspaper in April. The article referred to research by King's College, London University. Their trials showed that the distractions of emails, text and phone messages are a greater threat to IQ and concentration than taking cannabis. The trials apparently demonstrated that emails in particular 'have an addictive, drug-like grip'. The article said: "Respondents' minds were all over the place as they faced new questions and challenges every time an email dropped into their inbox. Productivity at work was damaged and the effect on staff who could not resist trying to juggle new messages with existing work was the equivalent, over a day, to the loss of a night's sleep." It's no wonder therefore that it's sometimes hard to maintain the high level of concentration needed to write marketing materials. So what can be done? I suppose the solutions are common sense really. For example, I sometimes turn off my email programme for a couple of hours to remove that particular source of distractions. I believe that if anyone really needs an urgent response to a question then they will call me, so I don't have to answer every email within seconds of receiving it. If you work in an office surrounded by colleagues you could follow the example of one writer I knew who would put a 'do not disturb' sign on his desk when he was writing. He had told his colleagues that this was nothing personal, but that he really did need some quiet time each day. Another method would be to take a laptop to a quite place and work there. Another point to be considered is whether your 'quiet time' should come at a particular time of day. Some people say they writer better in the morning, some in the afternoon and so on. Personally, I find that despite my own preference, deadlines and external pressures usually dictate when I write each day. Nevertheless, I am aware that I can write more content of a better quality at a certain time of day, so where possible that's when I get my quiet time. Managers need to play a role here. They should support staff who say they need quiet time for writing. The result will be work that's done to a higher standard, and probably created in half the time too. |