Book Review – Deep Work by Cal Newport. Improving Focus and Flow

Vimal Vachhani — Fri, 11 Jan 2019 23:18:52 +0000

Late last year a close mentor of mine recommended I read Deep Work by Cal Newport. As we ate lunch and I was complaining about feeling like I was always working yet not feeling like I was accomplishing anything or achieving flow. Even though I was always on top of my deliverables, there was an underlying feeling of “never-ending” or “incompleteness” that irked me as I’ve always been a task list oriented person and not having tangible boxes to check seemed to be driving me crazy. In addition to this, maybe it was a false historical recollection or an actual truth, but I felt my output had decreased over the last few years. When I started my career, I was referred to as the “track star” for the number of work items I could plow through and was a reason for a lot of my early success. I had done some initial self-exploration and knew a part of the problems was switching gears to frequently and thinking multitasking was not just necessary but also beneficial. Reading through Deep Work helped solidify what I was already starting to question, that jumping around and trying to do more things at once was actually leading me to do a lower amount work that was less meaningful. Below are a key few lessons that I took out of the book and items that I am personally trying to work on that have already proven valuable and started me on a better path professionally.

More Deep work and Less Shallow Work. Setting up blocks of time for when to work and when not to work.
Set a very strict schedule for yourself for when you will be working and when you will be checking emails. While you are working be deliberate on the item you are working on. During this block of time, that one task is all you do. No stopping to check an email, or social media and no jumping to another task. The goal is to hit a state of flow and do good deep work.
Set up 15-minute blocks of time for shallow work. Checking and responding to emails, or other housekeeping items. If you need a mental break, do it during this time as well. The key take away is that when you are working, you are working. For the brain to switch gears, there is valuable time lost as you shift back into a state of flow.
Kill the alerts
Every ping from your phone, or pop up on your computer screen will scream and beg for your valuable attention. Go into each setting and shut every notification off. You will learn most responses can wait until you are ready for your designated block of time to respond. I’ve only half tacked these issues by shutting off my notifications and still find myself responding to instant message requests but over time I hope to avoid the temptation and set better expectations with my teams in the future.
Do not be a human router
Checking and responding to emails less then 3 sentences for the most part just turns you into an old school phone operator, just moving information around from one party to another. Not much of value is created during this effort which you may think is a valuable exercise of coordination. Think through batching efforts and emails in your designated email time slots.
Set up a daily work schedule
Either the night before or first thing in the morning, plan your day and your goals. Break this down by the hour if possible but at a minimum, shoot for a pre-lunch and post-lunch block to get started. An extraordinary amount of time is lost sitting thinking about what you are supposed to be working on next and then sprinkling in a few random Google or Reddit searches.
Productive meditation (walking)
Get up from your desk from time to time and go for a walk over 5 minutes. If you can walk or bike ride to work, this also works well. Use this time to think about and meditate on the big problem for the day. Similar to those brilliant shower thoughts you get, your brain will be better able to crack problems you are stuck on when you free it and let it run wild in a stress-free environment. A nice added benefit will be getting your 10K steps in which equates to about ~350 calories burned on average!
Learn to focus
The author discusses a technique to memorize a full deck of cards but the overall goal is not to learn a neat party trick but rather sharpen your brain to focus. This can be achieved through other methods as well. I’ve begun a meditation practice, as well as created homemade memory flash cards which I will try to play every few days. As a personal experiment in improving my focus, I recently bought a 10th-grade Algebra book and try to work through a few problems every few days. No verdict on if this has helped but I have gotten better at 10th-grade Algebra again.
Shut down routine
When you are done with work…you are done with work. When the day ends, try to make a routine for your self that trains your brain that it is time to take a break. Make notes of what items you will work on tomorrow, close Excel document and save them. Shut the computer down, do not put it to sleep! This has been a hard one for me as I usually have items to work on in the evening due to the nature of consulting, but I do make sure from when I leave the office and I head to the gym and have dinner, work is on complete pause and not dominating my thoughts.
Quit Social Media
This is going to be hard for a lot of people. It took me a long time to wean myself off of social media but now due to the requirement of marketing my book and blog, I had to reengage the platforms. I have set aside three blocks of time in the evenings a week that I have marked as “Marketing” which I allow myself to really engage in social media. Although I have cheated a lot on this self-discipline tactic, the goal has been set and I hope to improve in 2019, hopefully, you can do the same!

If you have not already ready Deep Work I highly recommend it. I also talk a little bit about a healthy work life balance in my book Jack of All Trades Master of Some – An Introduction to Consulting.

Deep Work – jack of all trades master of some

Book Review – Deep Work by Cal Newport. Improving Focus and Flow